


Tech Junkie

by DaniLastName



Category: Watch Dogs (Video Games)
Genre: Asexuality, Awkwardness, Childhood Trauma, F/M, Fluff, Gun Violence, Human Trafficking, Smut, Watch Dogs 1, wrench - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-06-14 15:28:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 23,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15391797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaniLastName/pseuds/DaniLastName
Summary: "Wrench watched her as she gave a short wave goodbye and shut the driver-side door, starting up the van to head down the alley and turn onto a far street. He wasn't sure if he wanted to go back, especially with Ray having left so angrily. His phone buzzed with a text from Josh:Sitara is fighting with Marcus. Can we go get pizza?"Complete but may have a sequel; character asexual, smut's chapter 3Also, note: the personal experience of asexuality and all sexualities are widely varied and this is not supposed to be discourse material - just an ace livin'





	1. Chapter 1

The girl's home wasn't huge, but it was cozy in the way her dad had decorated the walls with LED sting lights of red and white. The kitchen was always stocked fully with alcohol and the basement carried vibrations of music through the structure. She had made a special syphon for her dad to have free wifi using neighbors who refused to use anything but the default password. She'd hooked up a large TV in the basement for his customers to enjoy while poker games and betting filled the air with the occasional curse or tangent. 

They'd complain about their wives, their jobs, and the city itself, blasting Blume for trying to create a utopia of automation. She could only listen when she brought them drinks or came to remind her dad how to use his phone to change the channel, then he'd send her upstairs with a hard pat on the shoulder. The men there always told her she was smart or thanked her for a cold beer and commented how mature she was to her dad. 

She didn't care what they had to say - her dad had always reminded her that the men who hit up his gambling parlor rarely became regulars, and usually ended up in jail for whatever reasons. They all had lives outside of the basement - lives that seemed distraught and troubled, always edged with domestic aggression or cyclical poverty. 

She was 13,and all she focused on, each day, were the afternoon hours when her dad would wake up and they'd spend an hour watching television or she'd try to teach him something she had learned about programming, before he'd open up shop and disappear. She was happier here than she'd been with her mother, who had overdosed herself with Oxycodon, twisted against the bathmat and toilet where she had found her. 

She'd stopped going to school when Blume took over by launching ctOS. The classrooms had filled with surveillance cameras and teachers began wearing creepy smiles to hold onto their jobs. Instead, her dad was fine letting her take classes online under another name while he slept through the morning hours. 

On a Friday, one of the busiest days for the business, she'd woken up to a Post-it note on her bed frame with an address scratched onto it, followed by the word _Emergency._ It didn't make sense to her until she heard gunshots downstairs followed by shouting. 

She jammed the paper into her bag - the one her dad had told her not to touch unless she had to leave - and scurried out the window, onto a metal awning he'd taught her walk across with her feet sideways to keep from slipping. He'd run her through these once every year since she'd moved in, claiming they were her only escape routes if a fire or burglary happened. She hadn't expected to remember it all, especially the roll he'd made her practice when she leapt from the awning into the grass of the backyard. It wasn't perfect, and she felt her back roll too hard while her legs still felt some shock from the landing, but she still twisted herself upwards, running toward the street and away from the swarm of police cars surrounding her home. 

 

She didn't try to find the address immediately. She still wasn't sure what she was supposed to be doing, entirely. If she went there, would they send her somewhere new, where she'd have to go to school and unlearn everything she'd been working on? Or was it the address for a police station, where she'd be interrogated and put into foster care? 

Her dad had told her _people are more willing to help than you think. You're still a kid, so keep your knife on you, but people are nicer to kids than anyone else. Look for big purses and wristwatches._

No one like that was in the neighborhood she'd ducked into. There were people wandering with dirty clothes talking loudly while the stench of fire overwhelmed any scent the foliage might have given off. It was still morning and a breeze was blowing cigarette smoke and the smell of humans towards her. She curled up against a cement wall that used to reinforce a gate that had been torn away. 

She unfolded the note from her bed post and tried to memorize the numbers and street name. She wished he'd written a name with it, maybe some general description to give her an idea of where she would be headed. 

 

She finally decided to hold the paper out to a group of men in construction safety vests, asking them for directions in the way she'd been taught to sound stupid and childish. He gave her the number for a bus route and pointed off in some direction. 

The bus smelled like dogs and cheese. She hadn't ridden in one since she'd gotten to Chicago, and the bus driver hadn't noticed her squeeze between two adults as they paid their fare. The man had told her it was about twenty minutes on the bus to Pawnee, where the address was located. She took that time to look through the bag she'd brought. 

Her dad already had it packed when she first arrived at his house. It stayed in her closet, nestled between an old guitar and her laundry, but now it was the only thing she had. Inside were clothes two sizes too big, various toiletries, and a chain necklace with dog tags he'd printed her name onto. 

She was settling the tags onto her chest when the bus took a heavy bump and the driver opened the door, signaling with his thumb as he announced it was the last stop. She tried to ask him for directions to the address, but he was on break and ignored her to duck into the bus station's office. 

The place she'd come to, Pawnee, was shorter than the high skylines she was used to. This place seemed to be built of real wood and groups of people stood on lawns chatting. She stared at the map on the side of the station, trying to find the street name until a woman asked her if she was lost. She claimed to be visiting her uncle for the weekend and the woman chipperly pointed the way, even going so far as to write down the directions on the back of her note. 

It was another fifteen minutes of walking before the girl reached a tall brick building with busted windows covered with cardboard and tin foil. She stood for a few minutes in front of it, biting the insides of her cheeks and practicing her stab-and-run technique in her mind before she forced herself to knock. The door shook in its threshold, old wood soft beneath her knuckles. 

There was movement inside before the door was pulled open, only enough to reveal eyes that seemed to glare at her. The person sighed and undid the chain lock, opening the door fully to reveal a man with long dreadlocks and black leather on his forearms. He pulled at his beard in a nervous habit and sighed again. "You must be Dave's kid, huh?" His voice was rough and low, with a hint of the accent she'd heard throughout the small town. She nodded and he asked, "What's your name?"

She pursed her lips awkwardly and looked away. "My dad called me TJ." The man nodded and pressed to the door, inviting her in with a sad look in his eyes. 

 

 

 

"Hey, uh, Ray?" Marcus was back at the HackerSpace finally, having run a few system corrupts on the Sons of Ragnarok. Ray was half-asleep on the couch and pretended he didn't hear. "There's a chick upstairs. Says she's looking for you," Marcus added awkwardly, catching Sitara's attention.

"What kinda girl?" Ray slurred, trying to make it obvious he didn't feel like moving.

"Uh, young. Really angry." Sitara shifted and stared at Ray alongside Marcus, who crossed his arms and smirked. "Like, your kinda angry, but way too young."

Ray scoffed, offended. "Love don't have an age, asshole. Whatever - lemme go see," he grunted, leaving the couch to playfully shouldercheck Marcus on the way up the stairs.

Ray wiped a hand across his eyes and punched in the code to the door. As it slid open, a woman in her twenties stood with her arms crossed and rage burning her irises. Before he could react, a fist collided into his stomach and he doubled over, grunting at the force of her small arm.

Marcus felt for his taser and Wrench finally noticed the commotion, looking over his shoulder from his new project. The girl started shouting.

"Ray, you fucker! You left Tobias in the fucking desert?" Ray pushed out a laugh and she got louder. "He thought he was in Hell, man! We've been in that shit hole house in Huntington, and he's been driving me _fucking crazy."_

"Alright, _alright,"_ Ray chuckled, partially straightening up to lay a hand on her shoulder. "Well, ya found me."

"Uh, hey," Sitara interjected, "we don't have an open door policy. Take it outside."

"You gonna be alright, Ray?" Marcus called up, watching with a flinch as Ray rubbed his sore abdomen.

"What, you got a crew now?" the girl asked. She looked over his shoulder at the graffiti plastered across the walls. " _Oh, DeadSec._ Makes sense now why you were on the _fucking news,"_ she snapped. Ray seemed overly-calm while the girl was displaying every sign of a woman with murder on her mind

Ray pushed through the doorway, disappearing from view as he led the girl away by the shoulders.

 

Outside, TJ crossed her arms again and shook her head at Ray while he beamed at her. "You're a bastard. How do you forget 170 pounds of psycho in the fucking desert?"

Ray shook his head and punched her lightly in the shoulder. "Now just _where_ in the fuck you been, TJ?" he asked, ignoring her interrogation. She let a smile slip and threw her arms open, hugging Ray tightly.

"I've been messing around the border. Putting caps in _la migra_ and all that." Ray patted her shoulder, not used to being hugged in public. She stepped back and breathed slowly like she'd been rehearsing her lines. "Look, we picked up some shit down in Truth or Consequences."

"Is that what they're callin' prison now?" he interrupted.

She rolled her eyes. "It's a city. A weird guy came into one of the businesses the Pack has been using as a front. He was buying ammo and shit, and he was talking about, you know, vengeance and DeadSec and the Chicago blackouts. I don't know anything else, but the guys told me he was weird and planned on heading further west - I guess he said something about seeing the beach. When I saw your little video online of you and that guy, I figured it had to do with that. Maybe." She pulled out her phone, starting to search for something, but Ray stopped her with a palm flat against the screen.

"Maybe we should have the kids downstairs in on this."

She made a face and scoffed. "I don't need some hipster brats playing in my sandbox." He chuckled. "Anyway, they were able to grab a signal from his phone, but it's been spotty since he started traveling through Arizona. Hey," she paused and swatted Ray's hand off her phone, "is there any place to eat around here that isn't seafood?"

Ray had found a decent burger place during his stint with the San Francisco DeadSec. It had tiled walls and chipper cashiers and all the shit he figured would make TJ remember the old days. She scooted in the booth-seating, rubbing fart sounds out of it with a smile.

"Now, a few questions," Ray started, already biting into his burger; she made a face when he spoke with his mouth full, "who the fuck is the _Pack?_ Why in the hell would you wanna be spendin' time in the South West, and why didn't you go to Springfield when I told you to?"

TJ sighed and pushed a fry against her plate thoughtfully. "I wasn't going to go live with some bitch I've never met just because you got spooked. I started doing little jobs wherever I could take a Greyhound. I hit Indiana and Missouri for awhile, then I went to Texas when I heard about the cartels starting shit in J-town. I figured I could do some good there. The Pack is a crew I worked with in Arizona and SoCal - we found coyotes - you know, the guys who sneak people across the border - and hired them to do it for our cause. I used that nifty ID printing you taught me and we incentivized the coyotes not to sell out their traffic to the border patrol. Last year, we got three thousand people relocated, all with ID's and socials and everything."

Ray was grinning. "Damn - you sure picked up the trade quick."

She smiled and continued, "When I got word about that guy in T or C, I remembered that video DeadSec put out after the 2014 blackout about how they were gonna avenge themselves or whatever."

"Yeah," Ray leaned forward and snuck a glance around them, "I don't know how big a deal he might be, but I think it'd be worth telling the kids here about it. They've been doing a lotta shit here, and if it's about DeadSec, well," he pressed against the back of the booth and scratched his bearded chin, "jus' seems right, you know?"

They were interrupted when TJ's phone buzzed and a text make her eyes glimmer. "Oh, shit, Marco says the guy's tag lit up in Palm Springs. He could be here by tonight or tomorrow." She bit her lip, typing a reply while Ray sucked he last of his soda loudly. She sighed again when she finished, slapping her phone onto the table. "So, these _kids._ I know they're DeadSec, and I know you helped them pinch Blume's taint out here. But... I don't know. I don't like working with new people."

Ray raised an eyebrow at her. "That it?"

She pursed her lips. "I don't want to work with DeadSec again. Last time I helped them, I was an informant for them in Austin. They were _so_ fucking full of themselves. They thought they were single-handedly keeping Blume out of their city - it's so fucking _Texan_ to take credit for shit you don't even understand." She pulled her necklace from underneath her shirt, revealing an older USB hanging from the ball chain.

Ray whistled lowly. "Oh, shit, am I glad to see that baby," he murmured as she unhooked it and placed it into his hand.

It was the backup encryption key he'd made for ctOS, a strong-lead for mining through any data using ctOS-styled encryption, or a quick entry point through any ctOS box. Ray kissed the memory stick and she laughed, but immediately held her hand out for it. "She's helped a lot of people already. I'm hoping I can use it out here, too."

She snapped it back onto her necklace and hid it away beneath her shirt.

"So, uh, does Ray have a kid?" Marcus was watching Ray and the girl on the screen of his laptop, a hacked surveillance camera pointed to the girl's back.

Wrench sounded like he'd stepped in vomit, gagging at the thought.

"Seriously, man - I can't imagine growing up with a guy that's wanted nationwide and who wears a _I caught crabs in San Fran_ shirt." Wrench wiggled his fingers like the little parasites.

"It seems unlikely," Josh chimed in, suddenly appearing from his workstation to join in. "She didn't seem to bear any facial resemblance."

"What was that USB she handed him?" Sitara asked from behind, hovering over Marcus's shoulder. "This seems kind of weird. He said she 'found him' and she said something about a guy he left in the desert?"

"When Ray first got here, he said he forgot a guy named Frewer at Helter Skelter." Marcus stared hard at the feed, looking for any sign that Ray wasn't comfortable. Instead, he saw him acting like any normal human, laughing and stuffing his mouth with a too-tall hamburger.

The girl said something and Ray's eyes went to the camera. The girl turned and stuck her tongue out, staring directly at them through Marcus's screen before the feed cut.

"She saw you," Josh commented.

"So she's a hacker, too," Sitara mused. "Wonder what kind. There's obviously something important on that USB."

"You think Ray's trying to make a deal?" Wrench piped up, grabbing Marcus's shoulders dramatically.

"Man, you think Ray's _always_ makin' fuckin' deals," Marcus laughed, wriggling out of Wrench's hold. "Nah. No one just punches a man out of nowhere and goes to lunch. Not Ray, at least."

"Well, whoever she is and whatever she has," Sitara said as she wandered back to her art spot, "we have no reason to trust her, no matter what Ray says. Agreed?"

Around midnight, the door of the HackerSpace slid open and Ray nearly tumbled down the stairwell. He'd been drinking, obviously, and earned a laugh from Marcus as he pressed his forehead against the cool cement wall. "'Ey, long night?"

"Oh man," Ray slurred, "that girl got her daddy in her drinkin' game." His Pawnee accent was slipping through, making his words harder to understand.

"So, is she like," Marcus asked carefully, "your kid? A weird ex I don't wanna know about?"

Ray took a long step, swinging away from the wall. "Nah, man! I been shootin' blanks since the nineties. She's m'friend's kid. Back in the day." His voice got softer and he seemed like he was telling a story to kids. "Good girl, yeah. Her daddy got killed back, uh, back when I was hidin' out. She's a smart'en." Ray slid over the back of the couch, signaling that more of his answers weren't coming until the morning. 

 

TJ spent the night in her hotel room watching the videos the local DeadSec group had posted - taking on Cyber Driver, attacking a porn studio trying to defame them, and even releasing hospitals from ransomware for free. They seemed different than the group she'd worked for in Austin, whose leader was a pink-haired _country girl_ who wanted to instigate Texas seceding from the US to keep it safe from Blume. Instead, Blume had moved in quickly and had surveillance up before the girl had even finished drawing up the New Texan flag. Here, the group seemed more involved in its direct community as well as the overall suppression of Blume itself. Rather than trying to run, they stuck their fingers into every open port and fucked Blume into submission. 

She wondered how closed off the group was. Some groups refused to go outside without covering their faces, while others took on the soap box approach of shouting for justice. 

A knock on the door made her jump, and she glanced at the clock. It was nearly two in the morning. She looked through the peephole on her tiptoes and saw a bald man wearing a suit, a smile on his face. She kept the chain lock up and opened the door. 

"Hello, ma'am," the man said as soon as she pulled it ajar, "I'm looking for Abigail. Is she here?" 

TJ shook her head and stared at the man's attire. Though he was in a suit, it was dusty and smelled of the desert. "No. No one here named that." 

He nodded slowly, putting a hand to his chin. "I see. Do you, by any chance, know about _DeadSec?_ I hear they're popular among the young people here." 

"No," she answered flatly and moved to close the door. His foot pushed into the threshold and she froze. 

"Ah, but, I see you've been watching their videos. You aren't _involved_ with them in any way?" His eyes narrowed at her and she felt a chill. It was the man who'd been traveling to find them. But she wasn't _involved._

"I just caught some links from a friend, man. Fuck off - I'm trying to sleep."

A grin twisted onto his lips and he seemed happy to play the game. "Oh, no - you were searching for them."

She didn't want to ask who he was or what he wanted - she was sure she knew. But his foot wasn't moving, no matter how hard she tried to press the door against him. "Don't watch my fucking internet history, pervert." She was trying to feign the confidence of a stupid twenty-one thing alone in a hotel, but realized her lack of questioning was more an answer for him than anything else. 

"So you're not surprised that hackers are here?" He was nearly laughing. "You don't seem worried at all that I got in, let alone that anyone could." 

She finally had the sense to kick at his foot while he was speaking, earning just enough space to press the door closed and flip the handle lock. He was outside the door, chuckling and rapping his fingers against it lightly. Eventually, he left, and TJ powered off her tech, covering up any cameras she could find, and tried to sleep. 

 

 

Sitara had been out all night, spreading the good word across any flat surface she could find. Wrench had fallen asleep on the floor by his bench, curling against the bins beneath it, while Marcus was uncomfortably twisted into the small couch deeper inside, and Josh had fallen asleep on his arms on his desk.

It was easy for TJ to take a look around while the men slept. She stepped carefully around the studded anarchist on the floor to touch the adhered studs on the 3D printer. She took information from multiple tablets and tech sitting around the basement. She even took a moment to make a single line across Ray's face with a thick marker from Sitara's space to give him a unibrow.

It was when a shout erupted that she was caught. "Intruder! Guys!" It was the digital voice of Wrench, who'd rolled over and knocked an elbow against the hard ground. TJ snapped the cap onto the marker just as Ray began twitching in his blackout sleep, and found herself caught in the eyes of three, entirely awake hackers.

"Oh! _Hey,_ " she greeted awkwardly. "You know, the lock on your door doesn't have enough probabilities. I got a runner to guess it pretty quickly.

Marcus leapt off the couch, holding the taser on his belt. "Hey, I dunno what Ray might have told you, but you can't be in here."

"Well, morally, maybe," she answered with a tired look. "Looks like I am, though."

Ray was finally waking up, a snort and grunt causing her to break away from Marcus's hard look. The man sniffed and mumbled, "Ay, TJ. Turn that shit down."

"Wake up, Sasquatch." She kicked the couch's leg and grinned. "Your gang doesn't like me."

" _No,"_ Marcus warned, "we don't like people breakin' in." 

She seemed preoccupied with the graffiti around the room. Ray rubbed his face and sat up with a groan. "Fuck, girl, I told you not to fuck with 'em. You're s'posed to build rapport, not just kick in the door and snoop."

Wrench started giggling and Marcus shot him an angry look. He ignored it and pointed at Ray, "You got fuckin' marked!" Ray rubbed his face again, trying to find what Wrench was laughing at, earning a chuckle from TJ.

"Ray, what the fuck?" Marcus asked, trying to inject seriousness into the situation. God help them if Sitara showed up, the den mother of the HackerSpace.

"Alright, hey." Ray kept rubbing his face randomly, hoping some mark would show on his fingers. "Okay, this is TJ. I taught her everything I know, and, honestly, I just wanna go sleep on a beach with a beautiful woman. I'm done running around and shit."

TJ cast a hopeful look on the men around her before she huffed and looked to the floor. "Look, Ray, that guy showed up at my hotel room last night."

"Who?" Marcus let go of the taser's handle, narrowing his eyes at the girl who refused to look at him.

Ray huffed when she stayed silent, and threw and arm over the back of the sofa. "There's a weird guy her group's been trackin' through the South West. Apparently, he mentioned DeadSec by name and made his way here," Ray explained.

" _Oh, a guy,_ " Wrench mocked, returning to his comfortable flatness of the floor.

Ray spoke louder, directing his voice at Wrench, "And now he's here and showin' up at people's doors." 

"Look, let's just wait for Sitara to get back and we'll make a plan. But you," he looked at TJ and nodded towards the door, "you can't be here."

Ray stood and stepped closer to Marcus, tall and dark-eyed. "She ain't goin' anywhere, Marcus. Not with some psycho already knowin' her face. I know you got your protocol and and shit, but this girl is my kin."

"It's not personal, man-" Marcus raised his hands in an attempt at peace "-we can't just let random people down here. You understand."

"Nah, man," Ray grit out, "I _understand_ that you kids let me in here because of my name. Now, she's staying for the same goddamn reason."

It was then the door upstairs slid open and the sound of paint cans filled the heavy air between them.

Sitara turned at the bottom of the stairwell, her expression hard as she realized TJ was there, and Marcus stood inches from an angry Ray. "What the fuck." Sitara glared at Marcus, "You let her in?"

"No! She hacked the door," Marcus defended.

Ray crossed his arms and cocked his head. "And what would be so fuckin' wrong about her bein' here?"

"We don't _know_ her," she spat. TJ stood near the lockers, trying to determine if she should be alert or disengage and turn to her phone.

"You didn't know me, either," Ray argued, throwing his arms open.

Josh's small voice intruded, "Everyone knows Raymond Kenney."

Sitara narrowed her eyes at the older man. "Yeah, Ray. We let you in because we needed you. This isn't some plus-one party where anyone can show up."

"Oh yeah!" Ray shouted, laughing darkly. "You _used_ me just like you _used_ Marcus to get everything done. You only let me in here because of what I had in my head! You're like every fuckin' Blume asshole I ever met."

Sitara bristled and spat back, "That's all anyone needs you for, asshole! You helped put an entire city in danger just so the Fox could play chess across it." Marcus furrowed his brow and looked to Wrench, who was emoting question marks as he watched the fight. Josh was leaning against the threshold to his workspace, a hard-to-read look in his eyes.

"Wait, what?" Marcus looked to Ray, who stared daggers at Sitara. "You worked with the Fox?"

TJ piped up, "Is that why you sent me away?"

Ray broke his glare to look at her apologetically. "I didn't know it was him. _He_ found _me._ I couldn't risk someone finding you, too."

"You let the Fox _steal_ data to hand off to a guy you didn't even know anything about, just to be worth something," Sitara shot at him, forcing Ray to turn back.

"You listen here, you-"

Marcus interrupted. "How do you know all this, Sitara?"

She suddenly seemed to sling back into reality, stopped by everyone looking at her. "I did some digging when he came in. I didn't trust him, and I still don't. You know he caused the blackout on purpose. Then he disappeared, and DeadSec knew the Fox was playing some fuckin' game with a guy with the whole city of Chicago at risk."

"And you didn't tell us?" Marcus looked between Ray and Sitara, neither returning his stare.

"She thought she knew best," Ray muttered, shaking his head to stare at the ground.

"We _needed_ his help with Blume," she argued. "I didn't want to lose that. But that doesn't mean he's a saint."

"Ray," TJ's voice broke through like a soft puncture, "why didn't you tell me?"

He was shouting again, "I didn't know where you were! If you'd just done what I fuckin' said, I could brought you with me! Hell, I could used another set of hands with that shit hole." She pressed her lips and rounded the corner of the couch, pushing past Ray to make her way out. "TJ! Don't fuckin' leave!"

"Guess you're good at hiding shit," Sitara muttered. Ray glared at her.

"I don't know where you get off thinkin' you're somehow better than me, Sitara. You've always acted like I'm some evil bastard lookin' to fuck you all over. All I did was help, and you still give me the cold shoulder."

Marcus turned to Wrench, who sat quietly on the floor watching. "Make sure she doesn't go too far or get found by that guy."

Ray redirected and pointed at Wrench. "Oh, fuck no, boy. You sit right fuckin' there. No one's followin' her."

"Why, Ray?" Sitara had an edge of chiding arrogance in her tone. "What's she got on that necklace you don't want us to see?"

"How the fuck-" He remembered their eavesdropping on him at the burger shop and he grit his teeth. "You all never trusted me, did you?"

The tone of the room hit a hard tensity. Marcus nodded at Wrench, and the hacker slid between Ray and Sitara to jump up the stairwell.

Ray shouted, "Don't you _fucking_ watch her, you little shit!"

 

 

 

Wrench didn't know if he'd actually go looking for the girl, TJ. He was just happy to be out of the screaming match. It was late morning and the sun was gleaming into the game store, a soft warmth adding to the relative silence of the shop. He stepped out onto the sidewalk and glanced around, making no effort to really _find_ her. He wasn't sure he wanted to.

As much as Ray had done for them, Sitara was right in the fact that they didn't know the girl, and Ray's word simply wasn't enough. Wrench let his shoes slap the pavement as he started towards the alley way. Down it, a black van sat with its back doors opened wide, TJ sitting with her shoes hardly touching the ground as she took a swig from a beer bottle.

"Bit early to hit the poison, isn't it?" he called down the colorful alley. Her head jerked up and he realized her eyes were red.

"Not in China," she mumbled, pointedly taking another drink. She pressed a cigarette between her lips and spoke as she lit it. "What, they wanted to make sure I didn't go tell everyone where your hideout is?"

"Pretty much," he shrugged, stepping closer in the hopes she'd offer him a drink or drag. She stared at him for awhile, burning the cherry of her cigarette bright.

"Is the mask more Phantom of the Opera or Batman?" she finally asked, holding a cigarette out to him.

He displayed carets and tipped his mask up just enough to light it. "I like to think it's more of a Spawn, Deus Ex, Ozymandias kinda thing."

She half-smiled and nodded. "So, what's with your group? I've worked for DeadSec before, and they've never been so-" she paused to make a smashing motion with her hands "-fuckin' tense. Usually, they just don't let you use your phone."

Wrench leaned against the open door of the van and spoke haughtily, "Well, we're pretty much the most accomplished and interesting and good-looking group, so-"

She scoffed and shook her head. "I dunno. Maybe I shouldn't have come up here. I could'a just stayed in Huntington and, I dunno, _Tweeted_ you guys or something."

"Oh, that guy. What's that all about?"

She was biting her lip. "I think he's a member of the OG DeadSec from Chicago. They were really pissed off after the second blackout, but nothing really came out after that. Now, this dude's showing up at my door last night, tellin' me he's been watching my internet usage and sees me looking at DeadSec videos."

Wrench made hyphens, then small dots as he thought. "Why would they wanna have trouble with us?"

"I hear they were super into anonymity, and thought that, if you broke that rule, you were in it for yourself and corrupting the cause. You guys use publicity to spread the cause, but it's not the same to them."

At that moment, Ray appeared from around the corner, fuming. "Get the hell outta here, Wrench. TJ, we're heading out."

She stomped ort her cigarette and stared at him. "Why? These guys are the targets. Shouldn't we-"

"We're _leavin'_ ," he growled, slamming the back doors of the van once Wrench was nearly pushed out of the way.

Wrench watched her as she gave a short wave goodbye and shut the driver-side door, starting up the van to head down the alley and turn onto a far street. He wasn't sure if he wanted to go back, especially with Ray having left so angrily. His phone buzzed with a text from Josh. _Sitara is fighting with Marcus. Can we go get pizza?_

TJ parked the van in the lot for her hotel, blowing the smoke of another cigarette along the dashboard. It danced along the faux leather and twisted against the windshield before disappearing out the window, escaping with a rush. The only thing Ray had said since they'd left was a command to go to her hotel. He seemed calmer now, resting his head back and staring out the window at a woman walking a dog.

"What happened?"

"Whole lotta nothin'," he answered gruffly. TJ shifted uncomfortably.

"Let's just regroup back at my room. Maybe you just need some sleep that isn't on a couch, old man." She saw a faint smile and took it as an agreement, jumping out of the car and searching her pockets for her room keycard.

The hotel's hallways were always silent, as though no one else stayed there. She'd seen a few tourists pass by, mostly older people with big hats and shorts, but, otherwise, it seemed empty. Ray ran his fingers between his dreads, sighing. "You know I always got your back. I mean, now."

She nodded, counting the numbers on the doors they passed. "Seems like there's some internal power struggle kinda shit. Not really my flavor."

He chuckled and pulled his phone out. "I just don't know why it was easier for Aiden to trust me than it is a bunch'a kids that knew my name before they knew me."

"I think-"

They stopped in front of her room's door. It was cracked open, a note taped onto it.

_Hi Ray_

_-Dave_

TJ clenched her jaw and saw Ray straighten in the corner of her eye. He tore the note off and threw the door open, stomping into the room with his fists tight. "Where are you, fucker?!" he shouted, slamming the bathroom door against the counter and kicking beneath the beds to find them blocked off.

TJ entered slowly, peeking around the hallway carefully before turning back to a red-faced Ray. Everything was where she'd left it - her laptop was still in the safe, the bedsheets were fresh, and even the remote for the TV remained perfectly parallel to her room's phone. "So, it's really a Dave," she murmured.

"Fuck this," Ray growled, searching for Marcus's number on his phone. It went to voicemail and Ray nearly threw his phone to the ground before trying Wrench.

She heard a digital voice answer and Ray spoke quickly, "Wrench. This ain't a fuckin' joke man. We're at the motel by Titus - the psycho fucker broke into TJ's room." She heard a voice respond before Ray thanked him and hung up. He began throwing her stuff into her suitcase and demanded she collect her shit from the safe and bathroom. "You can't stay here. I don't care where we go, but we gotta get serious. If he can break into hotel rooms and track _me,_ he's a bigger deal that I expected. "

TJ threw her bag over her shoulder and pulled her suitcase behind her as Ray checked the hallway and led her back to the front door. She could see her van through the glass door and Ray held it open, his eyes scanning the parking lot. The sun was still bright, and TJ had to keep her eyes to the asphalt as she walked towards the van.

There was a click and the sound of a car door shutting before Ray grabbed her by the arm and pulled her behind a car. Bullets began showering the metal body they fell behind and shards shot against the ground around them. She could hardly hear him as Ray shouted, "Fuckin' ambush!"

She dropped her bag to the ground and unzipped it, pulling pistols out for each of them. Ray checked its load and tried to glimpse the Dave from underneath the car, only to have asphalt splinter into skin. TJ kicked the side mirror off the car and held it on the ground, angling it to see the man shooting at them. It was certainly a Dave, masked in an off-white execution hood with the same dusty suit she'd seen the night before.

The mirror was tossed from her hand when a bullet ricocheted into it and TJ scooted closer to a tire. Ray was cursing, trying to find a point at which he could aim. Her fingers were trembling against the car's door and she had to balance herself on weak legs that threatened to let her fall on her ass. It wasn't fear so much as adrenaline and a complete lack of feasible options. She could try to shoot blindly, but there was a better chance of her losing that hand than hitting a man thirty feet away.

When the Dave began reloading, she heard the sound of tires screeching and another car door open. A voice shouted, "'Ey fucker!" and she peaked over the car's door to see Wrench running at the Dave.

He tackled him to the ground and Ray shot out from their hiding place, running towards the chaos. She watched under the cars as the Dave knocked Wrench's skull with the butt of his gun, kicking away to scramble into his car. Ray had only gotten halfway there before the Dave was starting his car. TJ stood and started towards them, Wrench lifting himself to run towards his own car, likely for a weapon or to start a chase.

The Dave backed out quickly, turning just enough to smash the corner of his trunk into Wrench. The sound of his body hitting the car before it shifted into drive and sped off reminded her of playing softball. Ray shouted, shooting at the tires and windows to no avail, while TJ ran towards Wrench, who'd fallen to the ground holding his side.

" _Fuuuck,"_ he groaned as she reached him, "who even does that? I know something cracked."

The passenger side door opened and she looked up to see the third hacker in a green hoodie, his eyes wide and his fists tight. His voice was even. "What the fuck. What the fuck."

Ray appeared beside her and touched Wrench's side, earning a yowl of pain as his display showed red slashes. "Yeah, I think he hit a few ribs, maybe." He stood and wiped his forehead of sweat, trying to think out a plan.

TJ pushed Wrench's hood back a bit to whisk stray hairs from his forehead. "It'll be okay. God, thank you so much. You saved our asses. I'm so sorry this happened. Fuck."

The other hacker was stuck in a cycle of cursing while Ray called Marcus again. She tried to help Wrench to his feet, but he cringed with inward-facing chevrons and a gasp.

"I can't go to a fuckin' hospital," he grit, "I'm not."

"It'll be okay," she repeated. "I'm gonna lift up your shirt so I can see if it's really messed up or if we can take you back. Okay?" Wrench nodded, unable to do much else as she pushed his vest down and pulled his shirt up over his chest. She took a moment to notice the home-done tattoos across his body. "Can you breathe okay?" He nodded again. "I don't think they're broken - just fractured. They're all in place and there isn't any," she pressed her shaking fingers against him gently and he groaned, kicking his converse against the street, "give when I press. It'll hurt a shit-ton, but I got some good stuff that can help."

Ray was with the other kid now, patting his shoulder intermittently, trying to convince him to get back into the car. "I can drive Josh back. Let's get Wrench into the van. Marcus told me Sitara went off on some pissed off artist thing for awhile, so we should be fine." He crouched beside Wrench's other shoulder and he and TJ pulled him up to stand.

"I'm good. I'm good," Wrench huffed, his arm clinging to his aching half.

TJ leaned the passenger seat back so he could gingerly lay back and she watched Ray speaking to Josh in the other car as he started the other car, backed out, and watched her as he left. TJ took a moment to breathe.

"You mind if we sit for a sec? It's been fuckin' nonstop today." She looked back at Wrench to see him displaying the default X's.

"You're telling me."

She smiled and sighed loudly. "Seriously, thank you. We were so fucked."

He tried to laugh but groaned instead. "No one shoots Raymond Kenney and his kind-of-not-kid on my watch."

"I'm not his kid," she corrected pointedly. "He's more like an uncle, if anything. I dunno - he's the _other_ dude I grew up around. That's all."

"Why'd he never mention you?" Wrench realized the rudeness of his question as it altered in his modulator.

"We had an agreement. If we were apart, we never knew each other. It's safer that way." She started the van and drove slowly, trying to keep from jostling the groaning hacker.

"You said you got pain meds?" he asked tightly.

"Yeah, and I got weed. Good-ass South American shit. You'll feel fine."

They parked in the alley way by the game shop and she turned in her seat to lean over him. She grabbed a bag from the glove compartment and sorted through a large bottle of mixed pills, handing him several of varying sizes. She fished a water bottle out from underneath the seat and shoved it into his other hand. "Take these."

He shoved his hand under his mask and took a swig of the water, talented at keeping his face hidden. She stayed close at his side and he started to seem uncomfortable, asking, "You a nurse or somethin'?"

She turned her face, reddening a bit as she realized how she'd been acting. "Kind of. I had to learn a bedside manner when-" She stopped when she realized she hadn't spoke to her to Wrench at all before the quick cigarette and beer break. He knew _nothing_ about her, and she probably seemed like a freak hovering over him. "Uh, whatever. Yeah, kind of."

Question marks gleamed at her. "Wait, no, I wanna know. What _are_ you doing here? Why is a random guy in a mask shooting at you?"

She blew a hair from her face and tried to determine between lying like she always had and just explaining herself. "I, uh, worked for DeadSec in Texas a bit as an informant. I got them data and scouted shit for them. After that, I joined a crew that brings people across the border and resettles them. We had a lot of people get sick or hurt on the way over, so we all had to be trained in basic medical shit."

His display lit up with exclamation points before returning to the X's. "Woah that's like... Extra illegal." She laughed and he arched painfully when he tried to.

"The guy that was after us, I think he's from the first DeadSec group and Ray thinks he's pissed about the 2014 blackout. Apparently the Fox refused to help them out before restarting the system."

Wrench nodded. "Awesome. More crazy hackers. Hey, can you do that thing with my hair again? I don't wanna lift my arms."

She touched her fingers to his forehead, just above his mask, and moved the dirty blonde hair that had drifted over his skin. He hummed happily and her hand snapped back like she'd been burned.

The door swung open and Marcus was there, a worried look on his face. "Wrench, man, you got hit by a car? The fuck?"

Wrench's voice changed when he talked to the other hacker. "Yeah man! It was crazy! There was this dude with, like, an old school burlap mask on and he was shooting at Ray and TJ, but I saved the day, of course."

She slid out of the car as he relived the scene with Marcus and she lit another cigarette. Wrench walked half-slouched beside Marcus towards the shop as he talked, leaving her alone to smoke and work off the last of the adrenaline from the shooting.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This work means a lot to me. Lemme know what you think. Criticism always welcome.

TJ grabbed the sniper rifle from the floor compartment in the back of the van and, once she was sure it would hold her, climbed a ladder to the roof of the game shop. She laid the rifle against the small rise of the edge and laid on her stomach, chin resting on her hands near the edge. She took in every entrance onto the street in front of her and looked for the Dave hidden in the sparse pedestrian traffic.

The heat was already making her hoodie too warm, and she wriggled out of it to cover her shoulders from the sun.

While she waited, playing Where's Waldo from the second story, she checked the ammo in her rifle, careful not to make it visible to anyone below. It was one she'd gotten from the Pack in Las Cruces following a successful journey through El Paso from Juarez. Her contact, Vincente, had slapped her on the back and shook hands with the man they'd brought over. His wife had been caught in the crossfire of a gunfight between a cartel and the police, so he'd come alone without much to say. TJ had lifted the compartment beneath the carpet once they'd crossed over and helped him climb out, offering protein bars and water with the Spanish shed picked up. She was embarrassed not to know more, but explained her almost total lack of schooling and time as best she could. Vincente always cleared up her errors with a grin and, now, translated for her to tell the man how happy she was that they'd made it safely and that she wished him good luck on his new life.

That's when she earned her first gift from the Pack, a modded M110 SASS they'd acquired from a Special Ops contact. She'd nearly cried when Vincente handed it to her and shouted _Para la Libertad!_ to the crew around them. The rest of the night was spent drinking and spouting discourse about the states of Central and South America and the need for organized reformation.

TJ sighed when she thought of it all. She'd been important there, taught Spanish on the drives back and forth between the countries, and actually spoken to as a peer rather than an annoyance. If it weren't for the Dave targeting them all, she figured she'd have gone back already. The pettiness of the DeadSec kids seemed insane next to the sand-storm-chapped nights she'd spent in brush and dirt. The most at-home she'd felt since entering the city was there on top of the room, scouting faces and sweating into her eyes.

The jingle of the game shop door opening made her glance away from the streets to see Marcus looking around and checking down the alley for her. Finally, she called down, "Lookin' for somethin'?"

He covered his eyes and smiled up at her. "'Ey! You comin' inside? We're, uh, having a meeting," he shouted, trying to be discreet.

"Can't. Ray knows what info I got and I'm keepin' an eye out here. Don't worry about it."

Marcus seemed confused by her refusal, but shrugged and went back inside.

 

She waited until sundown to finally leave her self-designated post to grab a beer from the cooler in the van. No one had come out for hours, so she figured the men were well on their way to having a plan of attack. For once, she didn't have to be a main player, so she could relax and think about other shit like all the movies she'd missed out on seeing and all the music that must've come out since 2015.

Of course, though, she got restless and kicked her feet on the gravel while she finished off the beer. She stowed her rifle back into its compartment and entered the game shop to a friendly greeting from the cashier and she smiled politely before ducking away to punch in the stolen code for the basement door. It opened to loud, happy conversation downstairs that made her hopeful progress had been made. Everyone looked at her when she stepped down, likely expecting Sitara.

Wrench was laid across the couch near her with an empty shot glass in his hand and exclamation points on his mask, while Ray, Josh, and Marcus drank at the long table with laptops opened to random programs.

Ray stood and threw his arms open, already tipsy, and slurred, "Ah, you're back! I's wonderin' if they took ya."

Wrench nodded hard and his display turned to hyphens. "I said, probably you already killed someone and had'ta get rid of the body."

She shrugged, finding it hard to enjoy drunk people when her drink hadn't caused even a buzz. "Nah, it was boring as shit. What're you all drinking?"

Josh wasn't drinking anything but soda and water and continued typing as the others shouted responses at her. Ray was halfway through a thirty of whiskey and Marcus and Wrench had been sharing shots of Vodka. She swiped the whiskey from the table and noticed Wrench pull himself up to offer a space on the couch.

"Ray said you prolly fought cartels and shit. Tell me your war stories!" TJ rolled her eyes and ignored Ray's unsubtle attempts to grab the whiskey back. She threw herself onto the couch and took a long swig, making a face as her sinuses and throat burned.

"Like what?"

"About the cartels!" he nearly shouted, pouring another shot awkwardly. He slipped it under his mask and she watched his jawline become visible as he knocked his head back.

TJ had never dated. She never wanted to. When Ray took her in, she never left home outside of buying food and selling ID's to the local high school kids. After that, she never saw the point. She moved constantly, and the only viable people she'd met were in the Pack, which had a strict rule against favoritism to avoid conflict and degradation in case someone were to die or be caught. Vincente had always been sweet, but he had family in Argentina that never left his mind, and she respected the professional distance he always radiated. But now, catching a glimpse of Wrench's hidden skin and the way he leaned towards her in expectation made her feel uncomfortable and uncharacteristically shy. She didn't like it.

"Well, one time, we were in Juarez trying to meet with a coyote that was on his way west." She took another swig, hoping her nerves would calm. "We parked outside a grocery store and this guy walked up to the car. I guess he was supposed to be meeting someone there, but we weren't them. Then, he gets all pissed off thinking he's been set up. Turns out he was from the Sinaloa cartel and they've been losing a shit ton of business because they've lost territory and their labs keep getting shut down.

"So, he pulls a gun and my buddy, Vincente, he pushes me down in my seat and puts a fuckin' machine gun on my back. The guy was shouting and cursing and shit and Vincente was super calm and kept telling him he'd shoot his guts out and shit." She laughed at herself while Wrench stared hard at her with giant white blocks. "Fuckin' manager from the grocery store comes out and starts yelling at us to get the fuck out of there and he was calling the Sinaloa a fuckin' pig-fucker cuz he sees Vince's got the bigger gun. Stupid-ass gets back in his car and drives off all pissed with this grumpy little fuckin' face. The manager made us leave, too, but we just met our coyote somewhere else. I always wonder what happened to the guy because he never met with whoever he was supposed to see, so he might'a gotten killed back home, anyway."

She was laughing at the memory, but the room was uncomfortably quiet. Wrench had apostrophes on his display when she realized Ray and Marcus were watching her from behind. She looked over her shoulder to see Marcus's lip turned up in a grimace and Ray had that sad look he wore whenever he found out her life hadn't turned out to be rainbows and flowers. She wondered if it was because he had a shitty life, too, and had tried to make hers better.

"What? You want a cartel story," she turned back to Wrench, "that's just a taste. Back in 2011, way before I got there, people died in the hundreds and even thousands. People that didn't even have a stake in the drug trade. Used to be, back in the day, you'd go to Ciudad Juarez and the sidewalks would be empty and you'd have to drive real slow or real fast to stay safe. Even heard about a little girl and her daddy in an ambulance that got caught up in it all. Both died there in the street."

She was only making it worse. Wrench drunkenly laid a hand on her arm, which she'd pressed into the back of the couch. "Dude, that's so fucked."

She felt offended at the response. "The fuck you expect? People die just to make bigger numbers for a boss to swing his dick with. People lose their whole fuckin' lives to causes that mean _nothing_ and they never even involved themselves in." The adrenaline of her anger was making the whiskey work faster. "Yo, Blume is evil and wants to destroy the first world with autocracy and hierarchal lifespans, but the world still exists out there. I had to try to tourniquet a woman's leg when BP shot her for running, but she was moving and screaming so much, she ended up dying before I could give her anything to dull the pain."

She sniffed in anger and twisted up from the couch, slamming the whiskey bottle onto the table. Everyone was quiet when she left again. She was always leaving. It seemed like the only thing she _could_ do when everyone was staring at her and she was getting this fucking twisting feelings in her gut whenever she looked at Wrench's vascular arms and hands, or when she'd stare too long at a tattoo and feel like puking from butterflies.

Outside, she spit on the sidewalk, trying to clear her mouth of the taste of whiskey. She cracked her neck and tried to figure out how to leave. She thought about being back _home,_ an endless array of ever-changing basements and living rooms in which she laid on the floor and had to push knees and feet away when her crew would kick in their sleep. She remembered the smell of a well-kept house where she'd spent weekends trying menudo and home-made helado con plátanos while Vincent's abuela fussed with her hair and remarked on how flat and lame it was.

She felt sick, torn back from the sun-lit kitchen to the nighttime alleyway of graffiti and bullshit. No matter what she did, she wasn't home without her Pack. They'd been open and honest and serious and strong. The people here, by comparison, seemed pliable and conniving. Her lip twitched and she kicked a tire on the van, letting her eyes tear at the feeling of homesickness. She slouched, letting the tears fall as she remembered the rare scent of desert nights after rain and the feeling of waking up safe inside a sleeping bag somewhere in Chihuahua.

A hand appeared on her shoulder and she jumped, pulling away angrily to growl, " _What?"_

It was Wrench. She'd expected Ray. She wished it _was_ Ray so she could at least steal a hug and cry into his weirdo tourist shirt.

"Hey, what's up? I," he paused and stepped to her side, pushing his hands into his pockets, "I dunno. I didn't expect it to be so serious. I'm sorry, TJ. Seriously, like, you're twice the man any of us are."

She threw her head to the side in passive aggression. "Yeah, I guess. You ask me to tell you a story and you stare at me like I ruined the party."

Wrench kicked a rock and gave her big X's. "You didn't. You're from a different world than we are - that's all. It's... Scary. We do as much as we can to free our own city from Blume, but the world's full of horrifying bullshit that we've never even heard about."

She nodded and grabbed a cigarette. She'd been smoking a lot since arriving. "Ray wishes I wasn't so fucked up."

"You're not."

"And that Sitara chick knows Ray and I don't play well with laws and authority. Marcus seems chill, and Josh is cool, but it's just not enough. I don't think I'm the DeadSec type, and that's fine. I'd rather just go home and keep working for the Pack."

He looked away and shrugged. "They didn't like me when I first showed up. One guy thought I was in a street gang and most people thought I was just in it for the violence." He sounded soft, despite the modulator making his voice a gorgeous song of seriousness. "But you ignore them. Just do what's right, you know?"

"I came here for Tobias. He's safe. I've gotten Ray back in my life. I don't know what else I'm supposed to do."

He elbowed her playfully. "Gotta kill a psycho!"

She smiled half-heartedly. "But after that? I'll do what I can to deal with Dave, but I might as well just head back and keep working the border." She sighed. "I guess I just expected this to be a new chapter, not an intermission."

"Well, I think you should stay for while. Or, hey, take me with you! I'll learn Spanish!" He seemed to get excited at the notion and TJ felt a weird happiness in knowing he'd be willing to travel with her. "We'll be human trafficking 2.0, serious and nice and non-profit. It'll be like we're fucking over the government _and_ helping people, so it's not evil and shitty!"

She had to laugh. She'd been called a human trafficker multiple times, but she didn't like the phrase. It brought about the image of people stuffed into trucks in sweltering heat, treated like product and moved into housing projects for cash. She gave lives to people. She gave them the credentials to work normal jobs and live in regular homes, she insisted they eat and talk to her on the ride over - even if Vincente had to translate - and she'd keep in touch over a fake !nite account. Some of her acquaintances had married and had children, while others were happy to find a job that paid for apartment to house a dog and cat and even birds. One man, whose real name she'd never learned, had opened up a pet sanctuary in Vermont and spent every day happily finding homes for the animals he loved. A woman she'd met from Peru was running a hotel in Michigan that offered reduced rated to the homeless and had been a major force in helping them obtain sustainable lives.

She was crying again.

"I hate this fuckin' city. I'm good at helping people, not killing them. I don't want to watch my back for assholes who just want revenge."

"I'll watch your back," Wrench answered solemnly.

 

Before she let his words mean too much, she opened the driver-side door and cursed, searching for the pill bottle. "Damn, your pain pills'll be wearing off pretty soon. I'm sorry, I just got so focused on scouting." She sorted pills in her palm and handed them to him one by one while he kept a happy face on.

"Yes, ma'am, whatever you say!" When he shoved his hand beneath his mask, she pretended to scratch at her ankle to get a look at his jawline again. It was like seeing under a burqa, the way it seemed so conniving yet inviting. He noticed and slid his hand away, dry-swallowing the pills with dots on his mask. "What? Tryin' to see my face?"

She shook her head and straightened up, crossing her arms to feign innocence. "Nah, just, ya know, makin' sure you took 'em."

"Hey, I promise you'll like me more with the mask on," he insisted, joking while still seeming to insist she respect the boundary.

She took a moment to think before slowly asking, "Would you really go back with me? You'd actually ditch all this just to go help with some grey-area shit?"

He shrugged and winced, a hyphen in one eye. "We did what we planned. All that's left now is cleanup and prevention, seems like. So, yeah - you seem pretty capable and Ray told us about the ctOS key you got. Seems like a better way to live than eating fast food and coding new programs for syphoning cash."

She smiled, a rare thing for strangers to catch her with in earnest. "It's weird here. Everything works whether you're here or not. Kinda makes you feel small."

"And I'm anything but!" he boasted, trying to take a haughty stance before the pain in his side made his slouch sideways again. "Fuck. I never knew a car could fuck you up so much without actually going over you."

She rolled her eyes habitually. "You wanna chill in the van? I don't really want to head back."

He agreed and let her open the passenger door as he slid in and gingerly laid back, breathing slowly as he relaxed. She went around and sat over the side of the driver's seat, checking her phone. He was staring at the roof and she made a point to glance at him every few seconds to stare at his tech tattoos and the anarchy symbol on his throat.

He made her feel like roadkill, like something too vulnerable that seemed like it would invite crows to perforate her insides. He seemed open and honest, much more like Vincente than she'd expected anyone there to be, but more excitable and silly. He rolled his head against the headrest and shot carets at her. "These meds are awesome." She laughed lightly and pretended to stare at her phone while she watched him looking at her. "Tell me another story," he demanded childishly, and she raised her eyebrows.

She told him about earning her sniper rifle. It wasn't full of action or threats, but he seems happy nonetheless, especially when she offered to show it to him. She crawled into the back and pulled it out, adding, "Don't let anyone see it. They're illegal in the US."

Wrench pulled himself up and swung around in the seat carefully to hold it. He ran his fingers across the barrel and its dual-sided magazine release, weighing it almost lovingly. "Damn this is some nasty shit. Have you ever used it?"

"A few times. Usually, we just shot to scatter patrols and distract, but I've hit a few down." He cradled the rifle against his chest and stared at her. She took the hint and laughed, "You can't fuckin' try it, no. It's illegal out here, and for a good reason."

He whined synthetically, "But she's so _pretty_ and she's just _calling to me."_ He made a high voice, "Wrench, please touch my trigger and play with my magazine. Reload me, _ooh yeah."_

TJ laughed harder than she expected, watching as he nuzzled the barrel with his mask. "Shit, my gun gets more action than me, now."

He shot her exclamation points and she realized she'd accidentally added an intimate tone to the joke. He asked, rubbing the serial numbers softly, "Do you ever get boners from weaponry, too?"

She snorted and shook her head. "Christ, no, but I do get a little excited when I go to the range. It's so hard and staggering."

"That's what the ladies say about me," he added, winking at her. She felt that twisting in her gut again, like she'd eaten candy and gone jogging. She put on a humoring face and reached out, requesting her gun back from him. He was hesitant, making kissing sounds as he pressed the spikes of his mask to the rifle. She slid it back into its hiding place and climbed back to sit in the driver's seat.

"There's a shooting range in southern San Fran if you wanna, ya know, ever go there. With me." He paused awkwardly and she widened her eyes, immediately searching Nudle for it.

"God, yes. I could use that." The business hours appeared on her screen and she checked the time. "If we go now, we could spend, like, an hour there before they close. It isn't much, but-"

He interrupted with a cheer and a groan of pain. "Fuck yeah! Then we can get burritos and drink more!"

TJ realized the whiskey hadn't done her any good, probably from the stress of having everyone listen to her story, and she nodded, turning to start the van while her Nudle map started navigation.

On the way there, Wrench excitedly told her about his 3D-printed guns with customized bodies displaying skulls and tentacles, then the times he'd spent shooting Umeni security and SWAT during their takedown of Blume. He slapped his thighs when he remembered one guy who had been on the outer range of his shock grenades and had only been knocked down and twitched before Wrench tased him in the neck.

She laughed along with him. "No one in DeadSec likes murder-y shit. Marcus always uses a taser and no one else even fights anyone." He sighed dramatically and played with the studs of his vest. "Ray was cool. I don't know anything about what he's done besides the public shit, though. I wanted to smash his face in once, but it kind of worked out. Even if he was a dick."

"Oh, Ray? Yeah - he's known to not give a shit about how you feel when a job needs to be done. It isn't, like, cuz he's evil - he just sees the ends as too important to stumble over the means."

"Like 2003," Wrench mused.

She sighed. "He was always fucked up from that. Sometimes, I'd wake up and he'd be pacing in the living room in the middle of the night, or he'd be on the roof for hours smoking. It was all shit he didn't think of at the time - there was an elevator that gave out, I heard about this one guy leaving his hospital where they had him on suicide watch and they found him after he'd hung himself. But, I don't think Ray should entirely blame himself. He had to show the world the overwhelming power of Blume and how, if ctOS ever went out by accident, it was a house of cards. Besides, without it, he never would've ended up helpin' the Fox, I guess, or with you guys." She shrugged and ran her hand through her hair at a red light. Wrench was watching her again, giant default X's bright in the dark van. "Guess I should've texted him or something that we were leavin'."

They spent just over an hour at the gun range, shooting paper targets and competing with each other over grouping. She hadn't used pistols much and had to play a good loser each time, but Wrench's ever-happy tone and the way he'd consistently forget to favor his side made her happy to see him win. Afterwards, they found Mexican food and stayed until the staff had prepared for closing and TJ had to apologize for holding them up. Wrench demanded, then, that they go to a 24-hour video store he loved near the warehouse district.

It was weird to see a legitimate video store, especially when its bright lights contrasted against the sleeping shops and yellow streetlights around it. Inside, it smelled like popcorn and dust, and a large woman behind the counter was reading a magazine. Wrench waved at her and greeted, "Hey, Bell!" She lifted her eyebrows and went back to reading.

He didn't seem put-off by her rudeness, and immediately dragged TJ by the arm to the horror section. Along the bottom shelf, ancient movies with ridiculous covers caught his attention and he rubbed his hands together. "Oh shit, they got Dr. Cyclops! And Devil Bats!" He pulled the cases from the shelves and held them up to her with carets. One was obviously an awkward photoshoot of a bat and screaming people, but he other showed a scientist with a flailing woman in his hand and a beam shooting from his eye and TJ had to laugh. She took the movies and read the sparse summaries on the back with a grin.

"So, you want these? Christ, they're $6. How does this place even stay in business?" She was musing to herself while she made her way towards the front and Wrench scrambled up from the floor to stop her.

"You don't have to buy them," he laughed, "I can always just torrent-"

She interrupted him with a loud noise of disdain, "And set up the VPN's and use the stupid right client or you'll end up with ads and viruses - nah. These are dirt cheap. It's fine. Plus, I owe you for saving us and showing me where the range was."

She laid the movies on the counter and piled candy on top of them, choosing two of anything that didn't sound boring. The lady behind the counter, Bell, seemed unimpressed and began typing prices manually into her register. Wrench leaned his elbows on the counter and rested his head in his fists cutely. "Is it fun working here?"

She shot him a look and kept typing. "No. Work ain't ever been fun. Y'all are the only people weird enough to buy movies on a Wednesday night."

"Why is it 24-hours if no one comes in?" Wrench asked, swinging his ass a bit.

She slapped a bag of gummy worms against the counter and cocked her head at him. "If I'm asleep during the day, Ned can't bother me with all that snorin' and fartin' and those _goddamn_ loud-ass sneezes." Wrench and TJ glanced at each other. It was an honest response, though somehow more aggressive than they'd expected.

She totaled up the order and TJ paid her from a roll of cash that earned her another rude look. Wrench was nearly giggling as he hugged the DVDs to his chest and followed her back to the van. She took a moment to stare around the empty parking lot, pressed against a dying strip mall where the video store sat alongside a laundromat and a salon. She wondered if she'd ever be there again - if a night like this would ever reoccur and she'd spend petty cash to hear Wrench's happy voice. Suddenly, she wanted that. She wanted to make him display happy carets and talk fast while he tried to explain why ancient horror movies were goldmines of untouched plots and ignored perfection. He made her sick, how he tried to bounce in the seat before he'd end up cursing and cringing, and how he insisted on trying to devour two entire burritos slathered in thick, rich sauce before capping out and whining in dismay at the waste he'd caused. Half of her wanted to leave that night and red-eye her way back to street signs she recognized and corner stores that knew her by name, while the other half wanted to hear him chatting away beside her and learning conversational Spanish with an unrefined accent as she took him far from anything he knew.

It was weird. She'd had crushes, especially when she first started out in Austin and found herself surrounded by good-looking liberals that could clean a gun and read her poetry. But she hated them, anyway. They'd go on about their deep understanding of the flaws of capitalism and she'd find herself bored at their regurgitation and empty thoughts. They'd quote Frost or Cummings and think themselves geniuses while she could hardly focus on their moving lips.

Wrench was his own man. He decided what he loved and liked and built, and refused to listen to anyone who would steer him astray. He clung to the 40's horror movies as though they were masterpieces, interested in little more than their daring uniqueness and bold failings. He reminded her of nothing, but instigating this lust for knowing more about him that she'd never felt before. She wanted to know every thought that crossed his mind and any opinion he had on anything. She grinned when he'd go off on tangents about obscure directors and long-dead actors, or the shallowness of music that made you feel instead of think. She wanted to hide him away from anyone who would pervert his perfect individuality, anyone who would criticize his anarchy symbol and claim it thoughtless when TJ knew it was a deeper belief in the human psyche that propelled him to hope. He wanted freedom for all, and, in that freedom, the ability to find the truth at their fingertips without the grip of corruption at their throats.

She realized she was in unknown territory when she thought of fucking him and forced the thought from her mind the way she did when she imagined jumping off a rooftop or slamming her car into traffic. She'd watched porn and had her private time since she'd gotten her first phone, but never had she felt the urge to act. It wasn't lust that made her imagine the noises he could make or the movements he could force from her, but the earnest notion that she could give anything to him without a need for reciprocation. She wanted to see beneath his mask, no matter what it meant, and watch a smile break across unseen lips. She wanted to feel the skin that hadn't felt sunlight and kiss the imperfections from his mind. He was so much more than a body - he was the beauty of a cactus caught in birth inside a terrarium that never broke. He was the songs of birds that carried across empty plains and the endless violence of humanity within the written word.

She gripped the steering wheel tight when they came to a red light, breathing slowly against his rant about which movies had ripped off Dr. Cyclops and his horrendous means. She slid her eyes to stare at his relaxed form, touching the studs of his mask and lax cloth of his shirt while he spoke. Everything about him was endearing - even the short curse words he'd utter when he'd move too quickly or she'd hit a pothole too hard.

They were back at the HackerSpace too soon, and she helped Wrench lift himself from his comfortable place in the seat to follow her into the game shop. She wanted to drink - as much as she could handle before blacking out, that was the goal when she hit the bottom of the basement and saw Marcus leaning over Josh's shoulder as they worked.

Sitara had been gone for too long. TJ took four shots of whiskey before she began listening to the rant Marcus was on. She'd left to tag a primo spot near the bay before she stopped responding to texts or calls. Usually, if she was pissed, she would let them know with as many adjectives as she could fit into a single sentence. Now, though, she was entirely dark and Marcus had a look of fear while Josh tried to find her last point of access.

It was somewhere in the warehouse district that her phone was turned off or died. Between half-manned buildings where stock was output while employees smoked and spat bullshit, Sitara had disappeared. Wrench left TJ's side to join Marcus as they watched Josh coordinate the signal and her most recent text. It was a text to Marcus: _We'll talk when I get back._

It sounded finite to TJ, who'd sent endless texts to men and women who had gotten her number. But the way Marcus bit his tongue and stared at the monitor convinced her she was wrong about the artistic girl. Sitara had been a bitch about Ray, but TJ could hardly find words to describe the number of women who would demonize Ray in a court room.

It felt unreal when Josh announced that he had found Dave's hiding place. It was a network of syphoned wifi and bounced signals that led Josh straight to a hotel room just outside the warehouse district.

TJ finally joined in on the viewing and a dimly-lit room came into view on another window. A man, masked in the same white burlap as the one who'd hit Wrench, leaned across a bathroom sink and pressed his forehead to the mirror. He was cursing and speaking too quickly to understand, but it was clear he was talking to his reflection. She almost laughed when the Dave punched the counter top and rubbed viciously at the burlap across his skin. It was serious though, as his GPS aligned perfectly with Sitara's last known location, and her apparent captor was far gone in a fight with himself.

 

 

 

The M110 SASS she'd let Wrench hug to his chest used 7.62×51mm NATO rounds that threatened to tear apart musculature and leave a body useless when hit. They were long, pointed, and thick, and had an obvious weight in her when she loaded one. TJ had left a round with Wrench before she climbed to the roof of a warehouse with the rifle on her back to flatten herself and watch for the Dave. 

Marcus and Wrench were in her van with the latter driving and Ray was jammed into a hiding place behind crates beneath her. It was morning and her eyes were heavy from the lengthy, loud planning that had lasted until only an hour prior. She only had a single chance to get it right, and they all worried that her failure could end up with Sitara gone. 

Josh's light voice came over the comm in her ear, announcing, "He's left his car. ETA one minute." 

She pressed to the scope and ran herself through the memories of shooting the rifle in the past. She touched the side of the trigger, measuring the pull distance, and breathed slowly. 

The white mask came into view and she inhaled, letting out a slow, loud whistle as she pulled the trigger. The Dave shot his head up to see her just as a round tore through his shoulder. On cue, Ray jumped over his blockade and threw his arm around the man's throat as he shouted in surprise. The van pulled up from around the corner and Marcus jumped out of the back, running to hold the Dave's legs together as he duct-taped them tight. 

TJ was sliding down the ladder to the roof when Marcus had finished taping the man's arms to his sides and Ray dragged him into the back of the van like a carcass. It was still early enough that they had time before the people who could have heard her shot would call the police or investigate, but she was quick to shove her emptied rifle beneath the carpet of the van before shutting the doors behind her and Marcus. 

Ray sighed happily in the front seat while Wrench twisted the wheel to take them towards Sitara's location. The Dave was groaning and shouting at them, blood drenching the suit and likely the carpeting beneath. TJ tore the mask from his head to reveal the face of the forty-something year-old man who'd tapped at her hotel room door and slammed into Wrench with his car. She'd worn a rubber bracelet, a trick she'd learned about dealing with kamikaze hackers, and pulled it between her thumbs before jamming it between his teeth, pulling the man's cheeks back painfully. He snarled at her and she had to beam at having him so perfectly captured. 

They stopped at a windowless building overlooking the water and everyone else was quick to jump out. Her role was to hold the Dave in case of hangups in the building that could require answers or biometrics. When she was alone and the men entered the building without obstacle, and grinned wickedly at the man beneath her. 

"You fuck," she spat. "You're like every other asshole that wants to dictate how others live, aren't you? You're pissed about your own failed group and wanted to hurt anyone who succeeded you."

He was hard to understand over the gag, but managed, "You're disgusting. You're corrupt and eat publicity like rats."

She glanced over her shoulder and saw Marcus hugging Sitara tightly outside the building while Wrench and Ray made their way back. She turned back to the Dave. "Didn't even have traps or locks." TJ laughed and pressed the bracelet harder. "You _are_ a failure. Can't even kidnap a girl without losing." 

Marcus and Sitara stayed behind while they disposed of the Dave. TJ had wanted to euthanize him and dump his body, but Marcus had insisted on _doing what was right._ So, instead, she tore open the buttoned shirt of the Dave while he salivated insults and promises of a Tech apocalypse and used a thick Sharpie to write on his chest: _I am psychologically impaired._   _Please help._

They drove by a hospital and TJ pushed the bound man from the back, letting him hit the pavement hard before they drove off. He wriggled in his binds like a drowning fish and she slammed the doors shut again before they hit the main road. 

 

 

Sitara had agreed that TJ could be around the HackerSpace, hugging Marcus again in a hold that was far friendlier than TJ had expected. It seemed like a game - she built the rapport and followed through on an op and, now, she would take Ray's place while he found a way to calm Frewer and convince him he wasn't a figment of his Hellscape. 

She was heading back to her comfortable bed and room service before any real decisions had to be made. TJ shook the DVD cases at Wrench, who'd been bothering Josh with congratulations and teasing compliments, and the man slapped his hands together. "Oh shit! Yes!" 

"Not yet," she warned while she shoved the movies into her bag. "I need some motherfucking sleep and, like, five kinds of meat. You remember where my hotel is? Meet me there later." She handed him the second room key in what she'd considered to be nothing more than smart planning, as he room number was written on it and her experience had proven that humans simply couldn't remember numbers over single digits. That wasn't how Ray took it, though. He crossed his arms and nodded up the stairs, signaling his interest in _having a chat._

TJ furrowed her brow at Ray, but followed him up the stairs and out to the sidewalk where Wrench had parked. 

"The fuck you doin'? _Wrench?_ Girl, I know you got enough brain cells left to know you can do better." He was speaking low and his serious tone made her snort. 

"What the fuck? I think that's literally how father figures talk about you, Bigfoot." She slid into the driver's seat and Ray shook his head. 

"Boy's got a thing for robots and shit - never even seen him _with_ a girl that wasn't that waitress girl he was stalkin'." 

TJ raised an eyebrow. "Sounds like _Always Sunny._ You sure you didn't just pass out watching FX again?" 

"Just don't be stupid, TJ," he sighed. "Ya never were good at makin' friends - you know it, so don't give me that fuckin' face - and I don't wanna be called back here because you two end up in fuckin' robot suits tryin'a kill each other." She smiled at the thought and nodded. 

"Oh, so, just don't piss them off too much. You could've just said that." She cracked her neck and started the van. "It's not always about sex, ya know." She side eyed him as she shut the door and laughed at his shaking head. 

 

TJ threw herself into the fluffy comforter and felt the springs of the battress embrace her. She had to lazily wriggle out from her clothing to squirm beneath the cool sheets, and it was only moments before she drifted off. 

She had dreams of reliving the previous day, shooting at the range with Daves instead of paper targets that fell and shook when she'd hit them. It made her happy to see them dragged off by nurses while Wrench's voice echoed cheers. She dreamt of kicking rocks along the streets of Pawnee while helicopters flew above, shouting commands at unseen trespassers. 

She was woken by loud, intermittent knocking that made her scramble from the sheets to jam herself back into the clothing wrapped in the comforter. "Room service!" Wrench's modulated voice called as she zipped her jeans. "Please be decent! I'm not paid enough to whore, yet." 

She opened the door and he gave a little wave as she let him in. "What time is it?" 

"Four-ish, maybe. Guess you're nocturnal now." He winked at her and looked around the plain room, nodding at the abstract wall art as though he gave a shit. "That's some real shitty framing, there. They got pine up against colors. Bad idea." He tisked and she let him criticize the decor while she connected her laptop to the television, the ancient sound of popping the DVD from its cheap case reminding her of lazy days and weed. She sat on the edge of the bed to work through the movie's menu and Wrench awkwardly pointed as his shoes. "Where, uh. What do I...." 

She pursed her lips and warned, "You better not shoe-up my fuckin' bed." 

"I didn't prepare for this," he lamented with sad slashes. 

She made a face. "Take your fuckin' shoes off. I don't care if you got a club foot and gout, bitch. I got my dad's nose. I can't smell worth shit." 

He shrugged and kicked his shoes off, stuffing himself under the blankets behind her. She looked over her shoulder at him to see him posing with a tilde wink. Dramatically, he purred, "Don't take advantage of me. I get really excited about old men in black and white." She had to laugh and shake her head, starting the movie. 

It felt weird, again. She didn't know if she was supposed to sit somewhere closer to him or stay at the edge of the bed. He didn't seem to mind her discomfort when she'd adjust and try to find a comfortable way of sitting like a kid at a desk while he splayed across the bed. She felt him move and he poked her back as the movie displayed a plane crashing into a jungle. "Hey, uh, up in front."

TJ was far from confident when she stood and sat at the top of the bed near where Wrench propped his head up on an elbow. She tossed the pillows onto him and pressed against the wall, crossing her legs. Everything was so trivial yet seemed to fucking important. She'd spent nights with friends who laid across each other and elbowed ribs without the sense of this heavy, intimate tone. It was all in her head, though, she knew, but she couldn't shake it. 

She couldn't just relax when she was alone with him. Her muscles were tense and her thoughts were scattered and she caught herself staring at the laxed lines of his hood and how his studded mask pressed into his tattooed forearm. It made her want to say something clever or get his attention with a joke, but she wanted to keep him focused on the movie at the same time to avoid making a weird comment or losing his company. 

She looked at the way his vest draped across his lean body and how it frayed around his shoulder. He seemed somehow too inhuman to breathe, but she saw the slow rise and fall as he stared silently at the screen. She always ended up getting so fucking vague and metaphorical when she liked someone. The few encounters she'd had - admittedly mistakes she tossed before they even touched her arm - had been driven by an artistic, ignorant love for humanity and its endless variations. She'd note how someone's hair fell across their skin and wondered if they noticed or had intended it, or a person's body language when they spoke to bartenders and friends. 

TJ had had herself explained by an engineer in Austin, Beta, whose constant fights with their pink-haired leader over inclusion and an infamous love of strip bars made her the LGBT figurehead of the group. She'd explained to her what asexuality was, a total lack of sexual attraction, and claimed it likely made TJ much more critical of potential partners and that it explained the preference to _dealing with herself_ like it was any bodily function rather than a 'draught.' 

It had changed her perception of the world - she wasn't lonely and never _suffered_ from a lack of touch, but she felt like a different breed when she was surrounded by allosexuals who pressed through small talk with a singular, fleeting goal. She _was_ a romantic, however, as she'd found out spending time with Beta at underground competitions and bar hops. It was her lack of interest in their bodies that made their minds glow brightly. She wanted to know what made them act and strive, but only ever found that knowledge hidden beneath ulterior motives of lust.

That was why Wrench made her so uncomfortable, she realized. Any accidental run-in with intimate tones was allowed to be lost in steep humor and banter. He was snug in her goddamn hotel room bed and didn't make a move to paw at her or comment on the situation. Instead, he came for the purpose of hanging out and simply existing with her. There was an added difficulty of whether or not he _would_ have made those comments if she was someone else. She remembered rants about the _friendzone_ and how painful it could be to realize a person truly saw you as nothing more than that when you wanted to be their reason to smile. She'd never had the problem, really, of doubting herself - she'd spent time learning workout routines with Ray that she'd never given up, and, at least around the allos, it seemed enough to catch whoever she'd glimpse. 

A man on the TV was looking through a microscope and she realized she felt a deep, pulling ache to hear Wrench speak. She shifted and pushed her feet beneath the blankets, taut beneath Wrench's elbow, and straightened her legs out. He looked over at her with blank X's that turned to carets. She smiled. "Pretty slow start," he commented, turning back to the movie, "but it gets good. Promise." 

She drifted her thigh to touch his arm through the blanket and, when he didn't move away, took comfort in his closeness. She forced herself to pay attention to the movie again, watching as zombies eventually appeared and dragged themselves towards a screaming woman. She giggled at the histrionic acting and noticed Wrench straighten his arm across her legs to lay his head down. She wondered if she could blush, never having been in a position of stressful nervousness like this. 

 

When the movie ended, Wrench didn't move. Instead, she realized his breathing had slowed and he'd fallen asleep draped across her legs. She had a thought, and ran through a list of pros and cons, before acting on it by pulling his hood back just enough to see where his hair fell over his ear. The mask wasn't held to his head, but somehow just gripped his face in a feat of engineering. She wouldn't move it, but, instead, ran her hand across his temple and swept his hair back into the darkness of his hood. The display was blank over his eyes and she had to force herself to wake him up rather than risk being caught playing with his hair. 

"Wrench." He seemed to twitch a bit, but his LED's stayed dark. She repeated, closer to his ear, "Wrench, wake up." The display flashed with several characters as he groaned awake. "Did you miss the movie?" 

He shook his head to clear his grogginess and sat up, TJ somewhat displeased at the loss of his weight. "Ugh, nah. No. Maybe a little. This is a comfy-ass bed."

He pushed his hand into his hood and she gave into the urge to pull it back, revealing the long strands of dirty blond hair brushing against a short undercut. He flailed a bit, grabbing the hood and shooting apostrophes at her, shouting, "'Ey!"

She laughed and pulled it back down, pushing her fingers into the hair falling over the crown of his head before he could fix it. "I love your hair. I kind of thought the hood was attached to your skin." 

"It's _supposed_ to be," he muttered, trying to pull the fabric over her wrist in a tug-of-war. "Come on - how am I supposed to be scary and secretive if you-" He stopped when she dragged her nails up his head, something she'd heard about men loving. Like a dog, he sank into the touch and hummed. "What're you doing?" 

She was struck a bit by the question. "Scratching your head?" she answered awkwardly, continuing the movements with less confidence. 

He hummed again, and turned his head slightly towards her. "Yeah, no, but, I mean - what's up?" 

She pulled her hand away and wondered again if blushing felt like this. She'd taken a step and it appeared to be miscalculated. She lurched sideways to grab her phone from the floor and pretended to think nothing of it. "Do you wanna order pizza? I'm starving." 

"Ooh, hell yes, but," he turned around to sit cross-legged, still favoring his side as he moved, "seriously. Were you touching my head when I was sleeping? I had a dream it was bugs, but now I'm thinking..." 

She twitched an eyebrow and brought up a delivery app. "Yeah, so? I was trying to wake you up," she defended lamely. 

He nodded and didn't push the matter when she handed him her phone to add to the order. When he gave it back, little dots displayed and she realized he was staring pointedly at her. "You're cool, TJ." She wondered in that moment if he was happy about free food or was about to explain to her why touching was off the table for the friendship, or, worse, that he had a girlfriend he never mentioned. Instead, he continued while she feverishly, anxiously filled out her payment info and hit Confirm. "Do you, uh. I dunno. Did you like the movie?" He seemed nervous. Those weren't the words he'd planned on using, she knew. 

"Yeah! I thought it was funny, but in a good way. Like, everyone was so sure of themselves and then they almost get fucked, but then they got away barely and mostly because of luck," she answered hopefully, wanting to confirm whatever good intentions he may have had. 

Carets of joy appeared and he clapped. "Yeah! Alright. So." His voice dropped again and TJ felt a twisting in her gut, that wracking feeling of unease and anxiety screaming in her brain. "I, uh, like you a lot." She waited for the _but..._ "Like, _a lot,_ I guess. Uh," he was stammering but she felt the weight inside her lift into something like excitement. "I wanna do this more. Like, personally." His display winced but she was no help as she stared blankly at him, unsure of what he meant and refusing to take the leap. He cleared his throat and threw his head back, holding his shins while he sighed. "Jesus cracker-shutting Christ."

"Just," she breathed slowly through her nose and pulled her lower lip between her teeth, "say whatever. It's fine." She still wasn't sure where he was going with it. He still had the option to contradict it all with a _but_ and an explanation she wouldn't care about. 

He rocked back and dashes showed he was closing his eyes in preparation. He spoke quickly, "I think you're badass, and I've never seen a chick snipe someone, and no one's ever watched one of those old movies with me and actually liked it, and it was really fuckin' cool to go shooting with you and, uh, I wanna know if you," his voice got tight and her breath stopped, " _wanna date?"_

She was sure this was what blushing felt like when her cheeks ached from suddenly pulling her lips into a grin and every worry in her mind drowned in the feeling of her head spinning. "Yeah." Exclamation points replaced the worried dashes and he stared at her for a moment. "But there's _stuff,_ I guess, you should know. First." 

He nodded slowly, wriggling towards her. "Like what?" 

She felt like a child. He was so strong and anarchist and she was about to lay out bullshit she could have stuffed away. But no, she talked. "I've never dated before. I don't know, really, what it entails besides sex and presents and shit." She felt gross mentioning sex and felt that sting in her cheeks. "I've never been with anyone. Like," she tried to press the word so she wouldn't have to say what she meant, " _ever."_  

He was thrown. Exclamation points appeared again, only to be replaced by giant white blocks she was sure meant he was wide-eyed. " _What? Seriously?_  Like, never, anyone, ever?"

She looked away and squinted like she was trying to find a good response. "Yeah. I've been busy and things never fell into place." 

Wrench clasped his hands, still displaying bright rectangles. "Okay. Hold on. Like, even when you were a teenager, you _never_ even, you know, tried stuff out?" 

She lowered an eyebrow. "I don't know what teenagers are experimenting with, but I stopped going to school in sixth grade. I learned everything from books and shit. What, are they just fucking in the streets or...?" 

Wrench threw his arms out, " _Yes,_ almost _literally!"_

She sucked her teeth and continued, "Look, people are usually shit. They're stupid and weird and think a good fucking will make you less focused on their tiny little brains." 

He laughed and grabbed the sides of his mask in a holler. "Oh my _God,_ that's so true but no one's ever meant it!" He blinked and changed to dots again, narrowing his eyes at her. "Wait, you're just fucking with me, aren't you? Ray's always getting chicks - there's no way that godliness didn't rub off on you."

"Ray's different than me. You are too, probably. Whatever." She shrugged and bit her lip. "Is that... Weird, or...?" 

Wrench replied almost too-quickly with exclamation marks, "No!" He composed himself and X' s stared at her. "I don't care. I mean, fuck. That's awesome. You won't have any of those weird hangups like _oh, I can't eat yogurt because my ex loved it_ or _why do you keep snoring in the same octave as my ex, you dick,_ so that's great. But," he put his hands out seriously, mimicking a politician, "I need to be clear. Are you seriously, honestly telling me that you're a virgin?" 

She felt the urge to slap him out of sheer embarrassment, but ended up pushing herself off the bed to fall onto the floor. Wrench launched himself forward to find her with her back to him, and she huffed. "Don't say that. It's weird. But yes." 

"Hey, wait, I don't mean it like that." His hand appeared on her shoulder and she eyed the login tattoo with a new sense of connection. "I like just hanging out with you. We can just keep doing that, but we can, like, hug and shit." 

She let a giggle escape at his serious tone and nodded. "Hey, um, shouldn't that have hurt your ribs?" She pointed at his chest as he lay across the bed. 

"Oh, well, I don't think they cracked. I think he just bruised me. Wanna see?" He leapt up before she could answer and threw his vest onto the best, yanking his shirt up to reveal a brightly-colored bruise nearly a foot wide and as tall. His skin was red, green, yellow, blue, and purple in random swirls, coloring the blank spaces of tattoos. She cringed and he nodded. "Pretty gnarly, right?" 

She lifted up from the floor as he pulled his shirt back down with a happy emote and stepped close to him. Exclamation points flashed before narrow dots and she smoothed her hands across his side and onto his back, hugging him against her. Her wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her close. Against his shirt, she murmured, "Thank you for all this shit. You saved me and Ray and now you're easily the nicest person I've ever met." 

"Anything for a chick like you," he responded with a cool tone as she pulled away to find the other movie. He jumped back into the bed and, once the movie had started, she found him holding his arms open with a tilde wink. It was different, being held up against someone while she watched the opening credits. She'd only felt this kind of physical closeness with people hiding with her under floorboards or behind barricades. But here, everything was calm, and she embraced the feeling of his mask pressing against her scalp. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the smutty one. Once I write more, you can skip it if you choose to. Lots of fluffy shit.

"So, uh, what now?" 

The movie had ended just after the pizza arrived and TJ found herself flipping channels endlessly. She groaned and slid off the bed to reconnect the laptop, searching for a torrent. "We could watch something else."

He bounced himself on the bedsprings and shouted a list of action movies she'd never heard of. She tossed her wrist and motioned at the computer. "I haven't seen or heard of that shit since, like, a decade ago. You do it." 

She threw herself onto the bed beside the half-empty pizza box and watched how Wrench arched over the laptop and tapped his heel to music in his head. He finished with a happy, "There we go! We're gonna work our way through Saw!" 

She shrugged and smiled like she didn't speak his language. Before he sat back on the bed, TJ put a hand up and he flashed question marks, stuck in a half-lurch. She bit her lip and asked slowly, "Would you, uh, mind just-" she tried to choose the right words before giving up "-come here." 

He crawled up the bed to her side and, while he sat on all fours, she ducked her head beneath his arm and swung a leg between them so that he ended up hovering over her. His display flashed to o's and she had to turn her face away.

"I am the king of this castle," he announced once he'd realized she was refusing to explain her intention.

She laughed and grabbed the sides of his vest. "I know your mask is the whole Spawn and Batman deal or whatever, but..." she trailed off and he showed downturned brackets as though he were sad. "I wanna _kiss_ you." She dragged out the word like a curse. 

The brackets turned back to o's and she felt him falter in holding his weight. Awkwardly, he asked, "Have you ever...? I'm not much of a teacher." 

"I mean, yeah, but only when I was fucking around." 

"You have to close your eyes." It sounded like a warning and a lamentation. It crossed her mind that he may have thought it would be a deal-breaker if he wouldn't take it off for her. Instead, she nodded and closed her eyes obediently. He took a moment before she heard the movement of leather and his voice, clean and human, hit her ears in a single word. "Promise?" 

She nodded again felt the softness of his lips immediately against hers. He moved his weight to one arm to bring a hand to her cheek and she tilted her chin up, pressing her skin flat to his. She felt him smile before he pulled away, explaining, "I would go on, but my half had garlic, so I don't wanna make you puke." She reached a hand out blindly to find him and dragged her hand to his neck, where she grabbed his short hair and pulled him back down, laughing before she pushed his mouth against hers again. 

Yes, she _had_ kissed before, but never like this. She'd never been comfortable or happy to touch them. It had always been a test of will to force her sexuality to shift. She wondered if she could feel that drive that allos felt when they made it this far. With Wrench, she felt like she was paying tribute to a God that could wipe her from existence or fill her life with prosperity. She didn't give a shit about tastes or smells or anything else the hacker could worry about. 

She felt him start to tense before she touched her tongue across his lip, begging him to stay. He gave in and adjusted himself to lay on his elbows above her, opening his mouth just enough to dart his tongue against hers. TJ felt that hormonal wave wash across her when their tongues touched and lips moved against each other. She couldn't focus on whatever her other senses felt when touch became her priority. She moved a hand up his side, behind the vest and over his back, brushing her fingers along his spine. He seemed to get a chill and threaded her hair between his fingers. 

TJ knocked him off balance when she pulled him closer to touch their chests together, his weight entirely on her before he pushed his knees against the outsides of her thighs and arched over her. She heard him chuckle as he pressed his forehead to hers for only a moment before pressing light kisses to her cheeks and nose. She covered her eyes with one hand to hide her own timidity as he pulled away. "You're amazing," she murmured, realizing her upper back had perked towards him and her spine wasn't comfortable in the tight position. 

She heard him placing the mask back over his face but refused to uncover her own. His digital voice returned and he laughed, "You don't ask for much, huh?" 

She slapped at his wrist with a grin, peaking between her fingers at the X's staring back at her. "I'd like to ask for more. Maybe." 

Wrench put his finger up, telling her to wait, as he ran to pause the movie, in which two men sat arguing in a bathroom and she turned onto her side to see better. He kept his figger up as he shook his head, hyphens communicating his seriousness; "It's gonna be special. I've never had this chance, and I'm not gonna waste it."

She snorted. "What, you wanna be a virgin-defiler?" 

"No!" He leapt back into the bed after wriggling out of his vest and she felt him slide behind her, pressing against her back. "I mean, I've never had the chance with someone like you. It's important and big and I wanna make it something to remember. I'm gonna be your Dark Knight of intimacy." 

She flailed at the sweet talk and nearly knocked him off the bed. " _Olle_ , shut up - you'll give me diabetes." 

He'd started the movie over, signaling that she was meant to pay attention. This time, Wrench laid flat on his back and she cuddled against his side, laying her head on his arm and chest. She felt so comforted by the human body against her, and reminded herself of the body language he'd exuded when they'd been at the range and how excited he'd gotten over adding extra-everything to his order at Taco Bell. She thought of how happy he was to grab the DVD's inside the movie store at night, those programmed emotes sending signals he couldn't manage without. She wanted to keep him there, far from the world that would tear his comfort away and threaten the untouched sweetness of his soul. 

TJ pressed against him in an unfounded need. She was used to tracking her "on" and "off" weeks, which centered around her hormones and sent her body into a throbbing mess at the thought of fucking, and was far less predictable than expected. It wasn't any one person or any one thing that would set her off - it was usually the stray thought of a cock in her hand while she tore noises from her partner, or the way they might wriggle underneath her touch. There was never a face in her mind when she touched herself - just the feeling of being filled or forcing sounds from the other person that drove her to use a vibrator and touch herself in physical need. 

She'd always felt a weird guilt afterward, the same kind she'd felt when she cut her arms in middle school and cried over her father afterward. It wasn't a moral guilt, but one that carried the weight of society's judgment over her inability to fuck anyone she saw. 

She was in the rare "on" week, in which she'd touch herself constantly and search for porn on her phone, sweating beneath blankets while she tapped through videos, never finding one that satisfied her.

Finally, she let a sound slip between her lips, unsure of whether or not she sounded sexy or gross. It was a light moan, but Wrench caught on quickly and pressed his mask to her neck in a symbolic kiss. Despite his comment earlier, she felt his hand on her side, drifted toward her chest. He skimmed the underside of her breast, numb from the padding of her bra, and she felt herself pulse between her legs in anticipation. 

Wrench seemed to understand the pain of wearing a bra when he gripped her breast entirely, fingertips pressed to her chest while his palm pinched her nipple between fabric. She moved against him and felt lost in the sensation of his hands. He was quick to move his hand to her crotch, where he rubbed one finger between her thighs and made her jump. She giggled in humility and heard him laugh softly in response. 

He forced one arm underneath her side and flexed his wrist to brush a finger against the edge of her bra while the other made her whine softly as it touched parts of her she'd never let another near. She was quick to pull the cups of her bra beneath her breasts, the sensation of fabric against her nipples hardening them for his touch. 

Her own hands had always seemed enough, but it seemed like a compliment how he insisted on touching her and enciting noises she'd kept secret. It was entirely intimate - thoughts of anyone at DeadSec or her past contacts flashed through her mind as she tested herself, pushing every one far away to focus on the tattooed arm bent over her side and the rounded points against her neck. 

She mindlessly pushed her ass against him and let another noise slip when he pinched his fingers around her nipple. The sensation shot straight to where his other hand touched, making her dizzy and wet. He chuckled lightly again, the sound of his modulator reminding her of how soft and low his real voice had been. 

She wanted him to fuck her, in all honesty. Refusing the touch of strangers and dates alike had never prepared her for the feeling of the sweet-talking hacker against her. She knew, though, that he had a plan, and she reminded herself of it every time his fingers would brush her clit and she'd jerk against him. He seemed to be enjoying her response, transitioning quickly between light touches and hard pinches that made her bite her lip and hesitantly whine. 

"Fuck, you make it hard to wait," he cooed, her body nearly trembling in his arms. "I could, you know, do other stuff." 

Her eyes shot open and she felt her pulse drop. "Like what?" 

He seemed happy that she'd ask, as he immediately rose and pushed her onto her back, her thighs between his legs. "You'd have to close your eyes again, though." 

She swallowed hard and pressed a hand over her eyes, giving control over to him. Wrench removed his mask again, setting it beside her where the studs touched her arm. He undid her jeans and yanked them down before pausing and asking, "You good?" 

She felt hotter at the sound of his voice. It was like candy she wasn't supposed to taste, like molten sound as it echoed in her head. She replied with a quick _yes_ and felt him pull her jeans away from her ankles before foreign fingers pressed against the heat between her thighs. She sniffed loudly, stopping a gasp of surprise. She was tender and horny, and his fingers made the nerves flare against the cloth of her panties. 

She could hear a grin in his voice; "Just tell me to stop, if you want." 

Her panties disappeared faster than she could register and she felt the full weight of her nudity beneath his eyes. He paused a moment before she felt the bed shift and the strange sensation of wet muscle touched against her. She cringed but let him shift her perception from reality to ecstacy when his tongue flicked against her clit. She moaned and arched, feeling his hands glide against her sides and settle beneath her ass. He held her close as his tongue pressed against her and she wanted to scream from the combination of shyness and need. Her hand drifted into his hair where she felt his skin and gripped hard. His tongue pushed into her and TJ's head shot sideways, a cry escaping as she felt the strange intrusion. She wanted more, but pushed the urge back as she focused on his grip on her ass and lips against her cunt. 

He ended up with his mouth across her, tongue gliding against her swollen clit while she moaned louder, an orgasm building in her core. Finally, she pulled his head close and bucked against his jaw, a feeling of emptiness combined with a climactic rush filling her body with electricity as she threw her head back to shout his name, an orgasm wrapping her tightly. 

When he pulled away, she flung the blankets over herself and covered her eyes to let him replace his mask. He started the movie over again and she peaked out, watching him stretch the leather of the mask as he seemed to readjust. He jumped back into the bed as though nothing had happened and brightly said, "Okay, this time, try to watch and _not_ be enticed by my incredible sexual presence." 

 

 

At the HackerSpace, they talked. Everyone had something to say and nothing really meant anything to TJ as she sat by listening - the Dave was out of their hands and Sitara was back, notably happier to see TJ than the last time. She'd fist-bumped her and thanked her for her help, they'd complimented each other's shit, and now everything was horribly normal. This had been why TJ was reluctant to take Ray's spot when he offered. 

He wanted to head to Huntington Beach and spend his days vegetating and rebuilding his playground of death without the fire hazard. She wanted to go somewhere where things happened faster than they could act. She missed having hiccups in an op due to sandstorms and unpredicted street brawls. Ray had his fun with _the Fox_ and ran intel for the kids as they took down Blume. Now, TJ arrived in the sunny little aftermath in which everyone was confident and cheery as fuck. 

She lolled her head as far back as it could sit and Wrench pushed her shoulder. 

Sitara and Marcus were apparently a _thing_ and Josh had been disinterested but accepting, but Wrench made it nearly a competition with Marcus when he announced, immediately after the reveal, that _he_ was dating _Raymond Kenny's almost-but-not-really-but-kind-of daughter,_ which had earned him a punch in the back from TJ, while Sitara had rolled her eyes will a smile and a sarcastic _Oh, thanks, Wrench._

It was all so easy, it felt scripted. Wrench pushed her again and she nearly fell sideways, finally giving him a high-browed glance. He was grinning at her, she knew, and pushed her again, even harder. 

Before she fell, she stood quickly, knocking the chair back loudly. Sitara and Marcus looked up from where they sat together on the couch and TJ thrust herself towards Wrench. The combination of pent-up energy and boredom caused a strength in her that pulled Wrench from his own chair in a headlock, and the two fell to the ground with him on top. 

He playfully shrieked and kicked at her, pulling her arm away from his neck enough to twist around and grab both of her arms, straddling her stomach. 

She pushed back hard enough to fake him out and pull him sideways, toppling him, and immediately sat herself on his hips, low enough to avoid his bruising. She tapped her fist lightly to his mask. "Boom. Headshot with a knife. You got owned, punk." 

He displayed inward chevrons in an annoyed expression and slapped his hands to the floor, screaming, "Fuck," loud enough that Sitara stood up to see. 

With a hand on her hip and a raised eyebrow, she asked, "What the fuck are you guys doing? Is this flirting? Cuz it's weird." 

Wrench was panting from the sudden exertion and pointed a finger at her, heaving, " _You're_ weird!" 

He looked back at TJ, who was grinning at her victory over him. She blew a raspberry and offered, "Let's go get high. I'm bored as shit." he threw his fists into the air with a cheer and said some nicety to the group she didn't hear on the way up the stairs. 

 

"I don't think you can say _headshot_ if you're using a knife." 

TJ scoffed as she pressed the edge of her lighter into the rounded bowl, easing the weed into forming a soft, even top. "Too bad you can't complain when you're dead." She smirked and he threw his hands up. 

"Alright, yeah, true. I'm just sayin' though, you gotta have good kill lines." She let the bowl glide itself into the downstem and pressed her mouth against the bong's large mouthpiece, breathing through her nose in preparation. "Like, _Smile you son of a bitch" -_ he was doing voices for effect and TJ closed her eyes in mock annoyance "-or, uh, _You're the disease, and I'm the cure._ " 

She pulled away from the glass tube to retort, "I'll remember that next time I floor you." 

He watched her light the edge of the bowl and fill the chamber with thick smoke. "You got lucky. I'll get you. Then I'll-" she gave him a warning glance before pulling the bowl away to fill the room with the sound of bubbling water and her eventual coughing "-I'll _do stuff_ to you." 

She handed the piece to him and lifted her eyebrow again. "Said the dead man." 

He made a show of being offended, sloshing the water inside the bong's base. "You got _lucky!_ I was badly positioned!" She talked over him with spiteful _yeah'_ s as she left the bed where they sat to find another movie on her laptop. "I've killed 'fitty' men! I'll murder you next time! You'll be like _Aw, jeez, this sexual God is so strong - how will I ever resist his strength and power?_  and then I'll spit the nastiest one-liner you've ever heard, and you'll literally-" he paused long enough for her to look over "- _literally_ cream yourself."

She made a face and laughed. " _Oh-k_ ay." 

He was behind her before she could react, and wrapped his arms around her waist to pull her suddenly backwards and onto the bed. She thrashed against his hold and he tried to make a move to roll them over to be on top. Instead, she took his moment of vulnerability to roll sideways, pinning one of his arms beneath her. He flung his free arm towards her, but TJ had expected it, and caught him between she shoulder and hand, pressing her chin to a knuckle to make him jerk. She held tight and and giggled as she used her legs to pull her from his hold to push his arms together while he wriggled angrily on his side. 

TJ felt a grin pinch her cheeks when he shouted _Begone, demon!_ and tried to free his arms from her hold, only to end up with his forearms pressed to his chest as she straddled his unbruised side with her knees on his forearms. He thrashed furiously for seconds before he sighed and his display shone with large X's while he stared at the wall.

She leaned forward, brushing her lips by his ear; "Smile, bitch." 

Wrench's mask flashed to o's and she clasped her hands, extending her index fingers to form a gun and she screamed, "Boom, headshot!" 

Her high was heavy on her skull by the time she'd moved off of Wrench and sat cross-legged to make a rude, provocational face as though she'd been an invading Roman, burning a home while its owner cowered. She was very high when he slapped his hand against his mask in defeat, pretending to choke as he died. She lost track of the relative point she'd used to tell how high she was when his display flashed to downward-facing brackets and it was more dazzling it see the LED's change in real-time with the face she couldn't see. 

Wrench sighed, calming his nerves now that she had claimed victory. He pressed the palms of his hands together and spoke slowly, "That was great, but," his head turned ominously and she stared hard, " _you got lucky."_  He pressed his fingers together and popped his knuckle, winking at her with a dickish tilde and caret. 

She growled in feigned anger and shot her leg out before realizing how much force she used. Her foot contacted with his hip and Wrench ended up pushed entirely off the bed, shouting as he disappeared from her view. She grinned when his mask appeared at the end of the bed and his hood sat halfway across his hair. He winked again before climbing back to his spot beside her. "There'll be a time, Black Cat, when your luck runs out," he murmured, leaning against TJ's shoulder. 

"Wow, action movies _and_ comic references? Next, you'll tell me you like when bands used beating a trash can as part of their sound and I'll be _hooked."_  

She felt him shift and he leaned forward to stare at her with large O's. In a husky voice, he said, " _Oh, I do."_  

She was caught between rolling her eyes at him and the high tickling her brain to make her more excited for his sake. "I do, too. You can't find savage noise like that with something that's meant to be used again." 

He twisted her sideways by grabbing her shoulders and pushed his mask close to her nose. "I _know,_ right? And that's _also_ how I describe sex." 

She started laughing, her head falling forward to knock her cheek against the studs. It was nice being high again after so much bullshit and drinking, and she smiled against the cool metal. Wrench seemed to nuzzle her, and she pulled him to lay back on the bed while the fourth Saw movie, which ended up being six movies longer than she'd expected, had already started, an autopsy onscreen concluding. 

 

TJ had chosen to lay across the center of the bed with a grimace as her high waned and he memory of eating too much Chinese felt like a punch in her gut. Wrench had his legs over her, thumbing through some feed on his phone. 

It was nearly nighttime and Wrench seemed tense, checking the window occasionally despite the drawn curtains. TJ had gotten bored, playing with the threading comforter while reruns played on the television. She was nearly going to suggest running away somewhere just for the fuck of it when Wrench sprang upward, pushing her down as he leapt from the bed. 

"Okay, TJ, get ready for this." He spread his arms like he was showing something off but she furrowed her brow and stared. Rather than explain himself, Wrench offered a hand and pulled her off the bed to press close to her. The mattress pushed against her thighs and she realized Wrench hadn't had the same plan in mind. 

His hands found her ass and squeezed her gently while he winked gorgeously, his LED's glowing against the yellow light of the room. The sound of the TV disappeared when he slid his hand up her back, one twisting into her hair while the other moved to her breast. He couldn't kiss with the mask on, so, instead, he chose the alternative of making her squirm. 

He kneaded her breast through her bra while X's dominated her vision and she felt small beneath his gaze. TJ pulled her lower lip between her teeth and smiled at him encouragingly. 

It was all he needed before he pressed her back onto the bed, touching every part of her thighs and abdomen through her clothing. She toppled him onto her with a pull of her legs and he growled, "You gotta get naked." 

It was obvious, now, that his plan had been to wait until dark, when he could turn the lights off and be nothing more than his own abilities. She found her button of her jeans and threw them to the side, earning happy carets before equal signs signaled his loss of expression while he focused on touching the curve of her hips and the swell of her breasts. 

Wrench moved to turn the light off, but she stopped him. "I know I've asked a lot, but," she bit her cheeks and hesitated, "I want to see your face... During..." she cleared her throat and stared at empty X's, "it."

Parenthesis and dots signaled he was looking away, possibly annoyed. She quickly added, _but you don't have to,_ but he already had a hand on his mask. His thumbs pressed against the leather under his chin thoughtfully. She wanted to apologize and move on, feeling the 'mood' drifting away. He seemed torn, cursing under his breath. "How about, lights off at first, but then maybe on if it's, ya know, earth shattering work that blinds you, then lights on."

She sniffed in offense and stuck her tongue out. "I'll turn it on when you least expect it." It was partly a negotiation, but mostly a promise as she twisted the switch and the room went dark.

She heard the mask move and knew his face was bare again. She didn't want to know _what_ he looked like, exactly - whether he was an Adonis or a literal mummy, she just wanted the intimacy of it. It was same level to her as hearing a person sleep or feeling their hand squeeze your ass in a supermarket. It was relationship-level, high-clearance shit, and she had already become bothered that she couldn't feel the rush of him kissing her without being in the dark.

He moved over her blindly, running his hands along her sides to feel his way. She felt his lips press to her chest, working up towards her mouth, likely to avoid catching an eye or hair. Despite it, she moved into the touch and moved her fingers to the buzzed hair on the back of his neck, pulling him closer. He moved against her mouth like he was hungry to taste her - her lips spread and his tongue slid against hers so aggressively, she felt herself begin to throb. His hand pressed against her hip, guiding her to move against him, and he slid it upward, beneath her shirt. He bunched it beneath her arms and she pulled away to let it fall over her head to the floor while he leaned back. He glided his hands across her abdomen, wrapping over her ribs before grasping hard around her bra.

She made an annoyed sound as she arched her back to undo it, throwing it across the room while he busied himself with smoothing his fingers down her sides.

Once she was bare, he was quick to push a breast into each hand, squeezing as he moved his fingers across her hardened, sensitive nipples. TJ moved her hips into him and groaned softly, wishing she'd practiced making the sounds he threatened to provoke. She cried out suddenly when his tongue appeared against a pebbled nipple, his hand pulling her breast tight. Feeling her own fingers was never as much fun as when she'd worn gloves or slept on her arm to feel as though they were someone else's, but Wrench gave her sensations unlike anything she'd felt. It was almost embarrassing how much of an effect he had on her. He pulled her skin between his teeth and pinched her nipples in his fingers beneath his tongue. She ground against him again, feeling the roughness of his jeans on her thighs with displeasure.

"You gotta get naked, too," she demanded in a gasp, tightening her fist in his hair as he nipped her. She heard his clean voice agree with a grunt before he pulled away and cold air hit her wet skin. His weight disappeared and she heard the rustling of fabric. She twisted around to be closer to the lamp, and and wanted badly to turn the light on right then when she could catch him entirely vulnerable, but urged herself to wait.

The bed shifted as he joined her again, reappearing to kiss her deeply, pushing her head back onto the mattress as he settled over her. She bucked and Wrench moved a hand between her legs as she tilted her chin to taste him. She made a noise of surprise through her nose when his fingers brushed her overly-sensitive clit and he pulled back. "You good?"

She laughed and cleared her throat. "I always just use vibrators. Not used to just goin'-at-it." He laughed darkly and pressed harder through her panties, dipping against her wetness before circling her clit. She whined despite herself and threw her legs up to tear the last bit of clothing away. His hands pressed the back of her thighs, trapping her.

"Ooh, insatiable," he teased. She felt his erection touch between her legs and she twitched instinctively. She reached between them to grasp him, feeling the thickness of his cock with an unseen expression.

Her voice was nearly a purr despite her surprise, "Jesus Christ, I thought porn was supposed to be unrealistic."

He laughed again, and she saw the outline of his head shaking as her eyes adjusted. She focused hard, trying to make out the details of his face. He was biting a lip, both eyes focused down between them in the dark as he moved slowly in her hand. She could see he was sexy, at least, and it made her grin that he had no idea that his face made her even more desperate.

Satisfied with her sub-par night vision, she released him and fell back against the bed with her arms above her almost playfully. Wrench took it as an invitation and moved back over her, using one hand to rub the head of his cock against her as he pressed kisses to her collar bone. She arched, her breasts seeming to scream for attention while she throbbed against the teasing touches.

He moved his hand from between them and slid it up the other side of her neck, whispering into her neck, "Ready, baby?"

She felt like she was blushing at the sweet name and pleaded with a moan. "Yeah, yes, _yes,"_ she repeated as he pushed into her, her heels gripping against the small of his back as he moved. TJ arched harder and moaned lowly, gasping, "Fuck, you really did it," as though he'd done an incredible feat.

"Not yet," he growled, a smile in his voice, and she felt him shift again before his weight pressed into the back of her thighs and he filled her entirely. She groaned and reached toward him, settling her fingers at his base, feeling herself wrapped around him.

He made another light growl and let her legs tighten at his hips to lean forward, catching her lips again to sweep his tongue against hers. His hand glided up her side, over one breast, and settled on the side of her neck, pushing her closer as he dragged his hips back.

He thrust in again suddenly, jerking a cry from her as he slammed into her without warning. She moaned when he paused again, seeming to love her anticipation against his lips. He grinned against her and seemed to overcome the urge to tease her, her eyes twistung shut as he began fucking her. She panted moans and her voice jerked in cries as he pounder against her insides, a faintness in her skull as 6her breasts bounced.

He angled himself upward, pushing her closer to the edge of the bed. TJ found her voice for a moment to beg, _"Please?"_ and reached towards the lamp. He slowed, still jutting his cock inside her, and told her to close her eyes first.

He bent awkwardly over her and the light came on, her vision red behind her eyelids. Wrench pulled himself down, close to her, and smoothed a hand up her waist as he hid his eyes in the crook of her neck. "Okay," was all he said before continued his assault. Her eyes shot open, but all she could see was blond hair brushing her jaw and the arch of his back. She reached around him to touch the tattoos on his back, scattered like graffiti, and pressed her chest upward in an attempt to push his head from her neck.

Wrench seemed to know, and sped up, pushing harder to arch himself and fuck shouts from her until her eyes could barely open.

Finally, he straightened himself, pulling her legs from his sides, pressing her calves to his chest so he could hide his face behind her feet. She giggled between moans and tried to wriggle her feet free, but gave in when he angled straight against her cervix, pounding her with painful thrusts that made her toes curl against his forehead. She was able to glimpse a mark of red skin above an eyebrow before her eyes shut and her spine seemed on fire.

TJ was too loud, screaming _Wrench, fuck,_ as an orgasm surged through her, her thighs tightening painfully while her nerves exploded with static. He moaned lowly at her noises and she was able to knock a leg free, revealing him biting a lip aggressively as his dilated blue eyes stared back at her, his hips moving unevenly as he came. She groaned from the sight alone, feeling him twitch inside her, his half-lidded eyes contrasting with a worried expression.

TJ sat up, sliding away to untangle him from her, and rose to her knees, wriggling close to where him. He seemed somehow stressed after it all, and she put her hands on either side of jaw to pull him into a deep kiss. He responded with what felt like relieved aggression, curving his hands around her ass to pull their hips together. As she pulled away, she kissed his nose, his cheeks, and the corner of his mouth before holding his gaze while he held him captive in her hands.

He shook his head with a pained look, wriggling from her grasp to push his head against her chest. "Happy?" he asked softly, a smile in his voice as he kneaded her ass.

She wrapped her arms around him, pressing her breasts into his face with a laugh. "Super." He tried to pull away after laying soft kisses to her skin, but she held tight. She murmured, "Don't put it back on yet. I love it, believe me, but... I want to see you." She ended on a whisper, begging him to agree. 

His voice was uncharacteristically soft, nearly breaking, "But it's not me." 

She wrapped her arms around his buzzed hair, gliding it across her forearms to wrap her fingers against his skull. "I want every part of you. Even the parts you don't like." 

He tensed and tried to cover it up by pressing his cheek to her chest where she couldn't see him. "You don't know that," he challenged, a rare weakness in his tone. 

She finally mustered the strength to move her fingers to his jaw, where he pressed against her hard before she forced his head upwards. Finally, he was in her sight again. She marveled at his blue, nearly silver eyes, and smiled as she traced his birthmark with her stare. He was looking away, past her at the ground or anything else he could pretend was more important. He looked sad, downtrodden like a slapped dog, and she had to touch her lips to his cheek. "I like your face. I like your mask and your brain and your sexy one-liners." A smile threatened at his lips. "Don't be nervous. I won't make you go mask less a lot. I just want this one time."

He nervously met her eyes and let a grin spread, brightening his features with a practiced, hidden happiness. " _One_ time," he agreed, touching their foreheads together with a sigh. "You'd be so far out of my league if I didn't have the whole sexy anarchist thing going." 

She rolled her eyes and captured his head to force his eyes on her own. "Wrench, honey, sweet thing, dork of ages, you don' _t understand._ I'm not attracted to your body or your _look_ or whatever you want to say. I'm attracted to _you._ I love the dorky things you say and your weirdly strong feelings about Finland's role in World War II and how serious you get when we wrestle." She nuzzle against his cheek. "I love _you,_ and the body you're in is just dessert." She giggled at her stupid joke and his arms wrapped around her waist, pulling her close. 

"You love me?"

"I do," she whispered against his ear. His hold tightened in a quick response of happiness. 

"You _love_ me," he teased softly. "What a loser." 

She laughed and pushed him away only to kiss him again, sweet and soft to thank him for his vulnerability. 

 


End file.
